Nicholas eventually drew close to the castle, outside of Hastings… or at least he did it as best as he could. He instructed his soldiers to stay back and he kept himself light on his feet.
For one reason or another, he felt a tingle in his veins. It was as if Nicholas could sense something dangerous in the castle of Duke Romanov. Even in the darkness, the crown prince saw numerous figures stationed at the outer walls of the castle. I
The prince didn't speak aloud but he wondered why there were so many men stationed to guard the castle. It was not unusual for a wealthy noble family to have their own garrison.
However, this castle here had way too many guards. And the crown prince could feel that something was off. Nicholas had a couple of inclinations in his head as he dared to come closer.
'This Duke Romanov is hiding something in the castle and does not wish for the people in Hastings to discover it.'
'He obviously wants to keep people away.'
Prince Nicholas Hannenbergh had a lot of suspicions that only seemed to grow as he went closer to the castle. He felt for a stone in his pocket and threw it in a direction directly opposite of his.
The men who were in the walls seemed to have their attention distracted and went to inspect it and that was Nicholas' chance. He was positive, extremely positive that if he got the chance to come closer, he would remember something.
And he actually did.
The memory flashed in the crown prince's mind.
Nicholas as a child loved scaling up and down the walls of Lord Ferdinand's castle. He was energetic as a child and one of the spots in the walls of the castle actually had some bricks that were a little shoddy which were good footholds.
The boy's constant climbing affected them… but more than that, there was a secret doorway in them. It wasn't strange for a castle to have secret pathways for the nobilities to use them.
"Duke Romanov has probably not discovered them…" Nicholas muttered quietly to himself as he reached the castle's walls. His heart was pounding and every inch of him was telling him to run away.
However, his curiosity was killing him and even if the soldiers had seen him draw closer, they couldn't stop him now. Nicholas pressed a hand on the shoddy brick and gave it a small twist.
The quiet crank alerted and pricked Nicholas' ears. If he could hear this sudden noise, a part of him knew that it was only him who could hear the noise but then he was too anxious.
He didn't know this, but the lycans were superb in hearing.
A small gateway opened up to him and Nicholas quickly stepped inside and then disappeared into the darkness. It was all good timing because the two lycans who were stationed on the walls had just returned to their posts.
"Did you think that the pesky humans started throwing rocks at us?" Duncan asked as he retrieved the pebble and looked at it with a frown.
"They have no reason to do so." Max sighed and rubbed his face. "I can't believe that you just made us leave our posts to retrieve a stupid rock. It probably came from a bird."
"Oh, so you think birds dropping rocks are more realistic?" Duncan asked.
***
Nicholas was now inside of the Wolfstone castle.
Well, not exactly inside of the castle but instead he was in the secret hallways hidden in the walls. The royal palace in Livstad had a hidden library and others too so the secret passageway in Lord Ferdinand's was normal to him.
There was a stupid grin on Nicholas' face as his heart was pounding wildly in his chest. Never did he in his wildest dreams think that he would be breaking and entering the castle of his grand uncle.
Was he going to die by doing something stupid like this?
Crown Prince or not, if Duke Romanov were to discover Nicholas inside of his now owned property, they had the right to punish him and who knew what the people in Frisia did? Nicholas didn't want to know.
He started to walk around and tried to listen in which proved to be a difficult task. The walls were extremely thick and he needed to find a way to maybe listen in to something important.
"Second floor, they've probably occupied my uncle's master bedroom," Nicholas muttered to himself with a bit of anger in his voice.
The idea that someone else bought this castle where it was probably filled with his countless happy memories did not sit well with him. The reason why he came to investigate was rejuvenated.
It was partly because he wanted to escape the marriage arrangement proposed by his mother, partly because he wanted to prove himself as a capable man… but the reason was mostly that he was looking for himself.
After his mother showed signs of good health, Nicholas worked hard to convince her that he would not put himself in danger if he could go to Hastings and investigate his grand-uncle's death.
He told Queen Marianne how much it would mean to him to do it before he ascended the throne. Finally… the queen relented, and here he was now.
Nicholas looked around him and then started to navigate with a bit of difficulty to find his way up. Soon he would hear something. The crown prince knew he had some selective hearing when it came to his parents, but now he thought he heard something that caught his attention.
There was light spilling out from the other side of the room.
"There's an opening!" Nicholas found himself excited and quickly walked towards the small light. What kind of secrets would the crown prince unveil by being here?
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From Missrealitybites:
Yes! Nicholas is SO CLOSE! Leland and Sophie were having a conversation at the moment on the other part of the castle.
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