"Okay we can do this,
but if anything happens because of your so-called taste for adventure, I will
never see the forest again, my dad will give me yet another speech and so will
yours," Asalis warned.
"My dad is basically
the Kings right hand man,”bragged Merk, “so if anything I should have every
right to be in the castle. Now come on, let’s go before we miss everything,"
Merk said running past the bustling market which came alive each morning with
the smell of fresh bread and colours of fruit and vegetables fresh from the fields.
The stall keepers watched carefully as the children ran past the carts as they
were very familiar with the two mischief makers. They had also become used to
the outlandish stories of the pair’s tricks as they travelled through the city.
"Over there!"
Merk said, pointing at a sewage entrance at the back of the castle, out of
sight from everyone. Its potent stench was almost unbearable, even at a
distance.
"Are you serious?
We’re not getting into the castle by going in there, no one goes in there for a very good reason," protested
Asalis.
"Asalis are you coming
or not? I am not going to waste time waiting for you."
Asalis hesitated and looked
at Merk’s eager expression and his eyes waiting for an answer.
"I will stand watch
and make sure that no one follows you but I am most certainly not going in
there," Asalis said folding his arms and standing his ground.
"Very well, your loss
then," Merk said, disappearing into the darkness of the tunnel.
Merk made his way through the many twists and
turns of the sewage pipes, occasionally upsetting the small creatures that
lived there. He finally found what he was looking for, a small passage leading
to a back door that was used by the maintenance elves of the city. Merk always
used this door to get into the castle, sometimes to listen in on conversations,
but most of the time just to snatch something from the kitchen where all the
glorious meals were prepared for the King, Queen and guests alike, a secret he
had never told Asalis about. Leaving the pair of shoes that he’d worn through
the sewer, he carefully made his way into the kitchen, bringing only a trace of
the smell that pervaded the sewer. He made his way through a small door into
the empty kitchen. He found it very strange that on this morning the kitchen
was empty given that all the Kings and Queens had arrived at the Kingdom. Who
was waiting on them? Where was all the good food? He crept past the servant
quarters where he could hear a woman talking about the meeting and what it
might entail as they had been told to remain in their rooms until further
notice. The very fact that there was such a secretive meeting had awoken
suspicion amongst all the elves as such a thing had never happened before,
meaning the meeting must be something of great importance.
