Iahotep was, to a degree, enjoying parading around this foreign beauty. Sure, her kingdom was inferior to the majesty of Egypt, but beauty was beauty no matter if it came in foreign form. Iahotep said nothing as she released her hold on his arm to inspect herself. It would not do them well to have her faint but her weak body had no choice really. She was not used to Ra’s power, but what did that mean to him? Her belief in false gods was her own business. Besides, it would be highly amusing to watch her collapse.

The woman was wise not to attempt to give him orders. Iahotep could play the kind host if need be, though his thin patience was no secret. Perhaps he might have been offended that she did not ask for his thoughts, had she not made a point. Indeed. They did not have torches and that would surely pose an issue he would have brought up himself in time. He observed her pass a nearby torch to Zoser, but otherwise said nothing. He was to be a good host and idle chatter was not his preferred pastime. For now, simply walking and observing would please him.

Iahotep kept pace with no issue and accepted the skein with a nod of his head in Zoser’s direction. Before he could answer his friend’s question, Iahotep stopped in his tracks. A soft frown crossed his face as he caught glimpses of the eyes of rats in the walls and the loud hissing of an angry serpent reached his ears. Lovely. He glanced at his companions before speaking. “What do you suggest we do?” he inquired. His first instinct, of course, was to kill the creature, but he thought better of it. Women tended to be so sensitive about these things even with dealing with a deadly serpent.

If he was lucky, she would at least not have a soft stomach.

His eyes shifted between what lay ahead of them and the decorated walls of the tomb. He was not one that particularly cared for arts beyond looking at them, but the decor was fitting for a pharaoh in his mind. He said little, for he felt no need to talk. He instead listened to the sound of his own breathing and the shuffling of their feet against the ground. He noted the absence of the noise of work and the quiet that soon surrounded them as they went further as he did the lack of torches on the wall. It did not particularly unsettle him. Darkness was darkness, what of it?

He remained silent as they traveled, clasping his hand behind his back as he was fond of doing, until the sound of something that certainly did not belong reached his ears. Music? In a tomb? The fact that he could not immediately think of the cause did not sit well with him. He scowled as he thought of a solution to himself. He could go alone, but that seemed like a foolish idea. He'd no clue who was playing that music, much less if they would be hostile. As far as he was concerned, it did not belong this far into the tomb, and therefore, was dangerous. Only a fool would rush right in.

He stopped walking and looked warily ahead of him and then to his groupmates before he spoke. "It is not wise to go alone." Nor was it wise to trust a Greek woman with uncertainty before them. What, was he to believe that his guest would remain faithful to Egyptian men should something go wrong? Ha! No, they would need Egyptians, witnesses...slaves. They had come across plenty, surely a few of them would not mind a pause from their tedious work in order to accompany them? He turned towards the way they came and shouted for a small number of slaves to travel down the corridor towards them. His voice echoed off the stone walls. He expected they would be a larger group in short order.

(Option Two)

They were alive, and that was important. He knew that Tim was feeling uneasy- and he himself was uneasy, but his external demeanor remained calm. If they could get through this, then they’d be stronger for the next adventure. The adventure was the most important part for Adrestus- not so much the outcome, other than getting out in working shape. They walked further into the tunnels. He was cautious about Hesi, not really knowing him or his true intentions, but he wasn’t about to leave anyone behind. They went into the tunnels together, they would leave the tunnels together. His feet struck the ground as he stopped in place once he heard the yells. “Tim…” He called, which he was immediately shot down. His eyes grew darker in concern, and he glanced back. He couldn’t see much, but the stranger was in trouble. They had to help. Adrestus stepped back from Tim, towards where the calls from help were coming from. They had to do something, they couldn't do anything…. He felt a pull on his arm as Tim tried to lead him away from what they had to do.

But Adrestus couldn’t. Morally. Adrestus couldn’t morally walk away… It wasn’t in him to do so. Adrestus’s lips turned to a grin as Tim caved, and he nodded at his words. It was reasonable. He understood Tim’s worries...but he was relieved and thrilled that they were going to help the other man. If they had just walked away, Adre didn’t think he’d ever be able to forgive himself. He followed Timaeus as they walked towards the voice calling for him, and Adrestus prayed that they weren’t going to be too late. They had survived the snakes… for now, and hopefully they’d survive this. Adrestus heard Tim lowering himself on the edge of the substance, and Adrestus cursed in his head. If only there was a stick or something…. He didn’t want Tim falling in either. Adrestus crouched down behind his friend and wrapped his hand around the fabric of Tim’s Burka with a protective grip. The last thing he wanted was Tim in trouble. “I won't let you fall” He leaned towards Tim’s ear and spoke calmly, his voice in quiet whispers, quiet enough that only Tim could hear. He wasn’t even thinking about the Burka now. All they had to do was get the man out of the substance, and they’d be on their way.

Timaeus had known that it was a foolish idea to help the stranger.

Even though the boy knew that it was the morally right thing to do, he couldn’t help thinking that this was all an incredibly stupid mistake as he felt his friend latch onto the back of his burqa. He was grateful for the support, but the stress of being so close to someone who might discover the secret that the boys had been hiding since they first arrived in Thebes was enough to tempt Tim into hushing the other boy when he whispered a reassurance that he wasn’t going to let Tim fall. Although the Valaoritis Lord was grateful for his friend’s words, the sheer amount of danger they were in was simply overwhelming. In fact, his own fear of being discovered had the boy biting down into his bottom lip so harshly that he was beginning to taste blood as he could little more than a nod in thanks. Once they were out of these tunnels and away from this stranger, Timaeus would be able to properly thank Adre. For now, he just had to pull the stranger out before putting as much distance as possible between them and him.

However, that plan changed drastically when he felt the grip on his burqa suddenly slip as his friend fell into the quicksand with a terrifying plop.

A startled noise escaped from Timaeus, instinctively trying to form the Athenian’s name. His concern for his friend temporarily overrode his fear of being caught in women’s clothing in the heart of conservative Egypt. Luckily though, the boy was able to quickly able to gather his wits about him before he could actually say Adre’s name. It was just a garbled noise of shock and hopefully one that would go unnoticed by this Greek-speaking stranger as Timaeus dropped the stranger’s outstretched grasp to fumble around for the Athenian in the dark. Even though the fear of Adre being caught in this thick mud was strong, Timaeus tried to not let it overshadow the fear of what might happen to two Greek noble boys if they were caught dressing in women in the Valley of the Kings. The sixteen-year-old had to remind himself that things could be bad now, but if the two of them slipped up, things could get much worse.

However, by this point, the effort was probably moot. Between the man being able to feel how large Timaeus’s palm was to all the little noises that the boys had made (probably including Adrestus’s own screams as he fell into the quicksand, Timaeus wasn’t sure if that happened due to the deafening sound of his own heart rate) the Bard with them would probably be able to tell that there weren’t two pretty women underneath those burqas. Perhaps by some sort of miracle Hesi had been far too distracted by his own predicament to take notice of these little details -- but the realist within Timaeus was not letting himself believe it. It was more than likely that he would be able to tell that the boys were well… boys. Perhaps if the two of them were more careful, they could at least hide the fact that they were Greek just like him.

That wasn’t here or now though. What was here, right now in front of Timaeus’s face was the fact that his friend was in the quicksand. Blindly, the boy reached out, trying to find where his friend had fallen in, but it was an impossible task. There wasn’t enough light to illuminate the pit and even if it was, the echoes of his friend moving about in the sludge, attempting to free himself made it seem like he was too far away for Timaeus to reach if he could locate him. By this point he was leaning on the edge of the pit, but it just wasn’t working. He was already precariously balanced on the edge and if he tipped forward any further he was likely to fall in himself. Then what was the trio going to do?

No, there had to be another option.

Timaeus leaned back onto his heels as he gazed around the darkened space, trying to see through the thin slivers of light if there was anything that could help him rescue his friend and this stranger who would definitely owe the boys a favor if they made it out of this in one piece. Quickly, his eyes locked onto the only form of hope that the group had; a few thick roots breaking through the ceiling of the blocked tunnel on the other side of the room. It didn’t take long for a plan to form in Timaeus’s mind as he scrambled to his feet. Knowing full well that the others might be alarmed by the sight of their rescue suddenly getting up, the Colchian was sure to point at the roots. He hoped that the two men would be able to see his covered hand in the dark and wouldn’t continue to thrash about as Timaeus hurried made his way over to the side of the pit. He didn’t know if they would, but he silently prayed to whatever god would be listening that Adre and Hesi would have the sense to not panic. Timaeus was certain that panicking would only make things worse.

This is why he had to force himself to stay calm as he found the edge of the pit and found that the stable ground was barely wide enough to hold him. Great, as if this really couldn’t get any more dangerous, The boy silently thought as a quiet scowl formed on his face. If Timaeus thought that it was safe to talk, he might have added a flurry of curse words that would probably make the hedonistic bard with them blush, but the cavern was deadly-silent as Timaeus carefully shimmied around the edge of the pit. Even though the clear danger that his friends were in was enough to force the boy to move at a rather quick pace, he was attempting to move slowly enough that he wouldn’t risk falling into the sludge as well. In fact, the boy nearly stumbled once, but his upbringing in the mountains of Eubocris had given him an excellent sense of balance and he was able to recover. However, this brush with disaster was enough to force him to slow his pace, even more, forcing a bubble of frustration to rise up in the boy as the low-hanging roots were almost close enough to touch.

If the boy had been a bit older and had the common sense of an adult rather than the teenager he was, Timaeus might have tried to ignore that his pacing was agonizingly slow. Maybe it might have been easier to trust that the other two would not drown themselves in the few extra seconds it was taking him. However, he was sixteen. He didn’t have that capability yet. Not when the stress of being the only one not caught in the sludge weighed heavily on him. With every passing second that his best friend was caught in that quicksand adding to the pressure, Timaeus was inclined to do something incredibly dumb and reckless that you would have thought that the boy was his younger brother with the sheer lack of reasoning that went into his decision.

Instead of ensuring that he was close enough to the roots to safely grab them, Timaeus was reaching for them the moment his fingertips were nearly close enough to brush against them. His fear for his friend had made him blind to the fact that if something went wrong or if the root didn’t give as Tim latched onto it, he might have been thrown off-balance enough to send him careening into the pit. No amount of billy-goat blood would be able to help him recover from that sort of stumble. Or maybe he would succeed in his endeavor and loosen the branch like he hoped.

But he wasn’t dwelling on the what-ifs or the stupid decisions he was making. Not when he was far more concerned with tightening his grip on the root and tugging it downward in one swift motion, hoping that it would come loose from the earth surrounding it.