Page 66 of Death of a Mortal

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At lunch, afew hours later, Nella motioned for Halden to join us at the table once he finished serving his food to all the servants.

He sat down next to Nella, the two of them across the table from me, glancing at each other nervously.

Teenage love. If we weren’t on a mission, I would have found it overly adorable.

“Hi, Halden,” I said.

“Hi, Naci,” he replied, his cheeks beginning to redden. I clearly made him uncomfortable.

Good.

Nella chimed in to break the tension. “We were wondering if you’ve ever seen or heard of any secret doors or passageways around the kitchen.”

He looked from Nella to me, then back to Nella, and cleared his throat. “There is a concealed entrance near the kitchen to the underground tunnels that mortals aren’t supposed to know about. Is that what you’re looking for?”

It was more than I could have hoped for. If the fae concealed the entrance to keep mortals out, and it wasn’t on the castle blueprints, this had to be the way down to the dungeons. Maybe.

I did my best not to get my hopes up, but that was difficult with this new information.

Nella and I glanced at each other and the corners of her mouth twitched into the slightest smile.

I gave Halden a nod. “I think it is, thank you. Where is the entrance? How do we get in?”

“You’re not gonna believe me but…a cook accidentally found it a long time ago, before I was here. There’s a room that when you open the door, you’ll feel…weird. I think there must be some magic. But the room just looks like a storage room with damaged paintings, broken furniture, stuff nobody would go looking for. There’s a fireplace in the back that isn’t really there. It’s just an illusion. You can walk right through and then you’re in the tunnels. But it’s a maze down there. People have gone down and never come back.”

“This is exactly what I was looking for. Thank you.”

He smiled at me. “The door is second on the right side of the hall if you take a right out of here.” He looked at Nella and his smile dropped a fraction. “Be really careful if you go down there. We’re not supposed to know about it. If you go, please don’t get caught.”

“Definitely. Thank you,” Nella said, looking at him with puppy-dog eyes. And then she kissed him on the cheek, turning his face an even deeper shade of red than his hair.

He glanced nervously at me before saying goodbye to Nella and returning to the kitchen.

She was positively beaming.

“Do you love him, Nella?”

Her face was nearly as red as his had been.

“I don’t know…maybe? I think he loves me, though.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Well…he told me he did.”

My little lamb had found her first love. I was so happy for her I could have cried.

“Just make sure and keep him in line so I don’t have to.”

She rolled her eyes at me, but the smile stayed on her face for the entire rest of lunch.

We didn’t dare say more about the tunnels here, but it felt like the first real clue. Like we might actually be on the right track.

On the way back to the laundry area, I thought it might be time to have another chat with the gossipers to see if they knew anything about the tunnels. We knew how to get in, but what we really needed was to talk to someone who had been down there. The navigation sounded difficult. And when I told Nella this back at our station, she agreed.

I glanced over to find Ott and Moe with their heads already together at their folding station, undoubtedly swapping rumors.