Page 56 of A Tempest of Intrigue (Tempest of Shadows #4)

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

Ryker

I leaned against the wall and folded my arms over my chest as I studied the dungeon. I tried to place myself in the shoes of my sperm donor as I sought to think like him.

While he most likely had it hidden behind a wall or safely tucked down a hidden passage, it wouldn’t be in the same area where his guests would sleep. It wouldn’t be in one of the towers that could be taken out by enemy fire, and it wouldn’t be somewhere a lot of immortals congregated.

He’d have hidden rooms all over this place, and I was sure he’d slaughtered all those who’d helped create them before they could ever leave. He would be the only one who knew its location, and the treasury might not even be in the castle.

He could have hidden it somewhere on the grounds or in Tempest. I doubted it because he wouldn’t be far from his money, but it was possible.

My father’s arrogance would lead him to believe no one would ever dare to make a stand against his castle. He was probably certain he’d ensured that when he helped seal Tempest off from the other realms.

Before the curse, he would have ensured his money was well hidden, especially since he built his castle during the Ghoul War. There was no way he would have allowed those flesh-eating freaks to get their hands on his money.

Which meant he’d hid it, but where? The obvious answer was in his suite, where he could keep an eye on it, but my father was never one for the obvious.

If someone did manage to breach his defenses, his apartment would be the first place they’d check. And while I’d managed to make it to his apartment before to do some exploring, I’d never had a chance to thoroughly examine it.

That servant was on me ten feet after I stepped off the stairs. Behind him had stood two sentries who wouldn’t have allowed me free rein of my father’s apartments.

They were aware we couldn’t tolerate each other. So, if he had hidden his treasury in his apartment, I’d never be able to search for it.

If it was somewhere else, there were so many empty and useless rooms to hide it, and my chances of finding it were slim. There was one place no one would ever expect him to hide the carisle he’d stolen from this realm… the dungeons.

It was a long shot but a possibility, and to me, it was a bigger one than any of the guest rooms. Criminals would sleep on top of his money, but they’d never think to search for it.

If the ghouls had attacked the castle, his carisle would have been safe from anything they unleashed on the towering structure. No cannonballs or bombs would penetrate this deep below the earth; not even dragon fire would destroy these dungeons. The rest of the structure might crumble, but these two bottom floors would survive.

Stepping away from the wall, I made my way back down the hallway. As I walked, I prodded the large, gray stones lining the walls. I pulled on the light fixtures and examined the floor.

I entered the cells when I couldn’t find anything in the hallway. Even with the doors open, the six-by-four rooms felt too small.

Taking a deep breath, I stepped back out of the cell. I stared inside the small space while memories of my time in Doomed Valley, inside a similar cell, threatened to overwhelm me.

My hands fisted, and I closed my eyes as the haunting sound of a whip slashing flesh echoed in my ears. The ophidians weren’t the first to beat or imprison me; my father had taken that title, but they’d locked us into cages and forced us to watch while they killed our friends.

The memory of the smell, the sounds, and the pain bombarded me as I took another step away from the door.

You will do this.

None of those fuckers will defeat you.

Taking another deep breath, I opened my eyes and entered the next cell. Sweat beaded my forehead, and my heart beat far faster than it should, but I kept my attention on the task as I ran my hands over the walls, lifted the blankets from the dirt floor, as there were no beds in the room, and examined the ground.

It took me a few hours to search all the rooms, but ultimately, I found nothing. I still believed he might have hidden something, but I couldn’t find it.

Retreating from the final cell, I climbed the stairs back toward the floor with the weapons room. There was a possibility he’d hidden his money in there, safely locked away beneath the armaments, but I couldn’t search in there today.

I was almost to the top of the stairs when voices halted me in the stairwell. Pressing my back against the stone wall, I listened to the footsteps of the men and women walking down the hall.

I caught pieces of what they said, but there were so many of them that their conversations tumbled over each other. It must be time for a training session. My father’s head of guard would have the key.

I waited until the voices and footsteps faded before climbing the remaining stairs to the first floor. It was time to see if my father had returned from the palace.

I much preferred the dungeon.