"Oh, no," she said, releasing him, nevertheless, "you shall be off and away. I, Kara—" and it was ridiculous how she strutted in the manner of Tokalji, himself—"will set you free—because I love you."
"But I am the enemy of your tribe—your enemy," replied Nikka. "You do not realize what you do."
"I care not who you are," she insisted. "I love you. I care that for the tribe!"
She snapped her fingers.
"But come," she added as a crash sounded outside. "They have broken in a window. Follow me."
She led us into an adjoining room, where in the thickness of the wall a narrow stairway corkscrewed upward, debouching on the upper floor. Here was a long hall, with rooms opening off it, their windows usually on the inner courtyard, the Garden of the Cedars of the First Hugh's Instructions. She turned to the right, and entered one of the rooms. A ladder leaned against the wall below a trap-door in the roof. In a corner stood a bedstead, which she stripped of its clothes, revealing the cords that served for springs.
"Cut those with your knife," she said. "When we take to the roofs we will need them to help us down again."
Nikka did as she directed, while I shut the door, and piled the few articles of furniture against it. Tokalji's men were in full cry downstairs.
"There is more than enough rope here," said Nikka, coiling it on his arm. "Some of it I am going to use for you."
"What?"