Chapter 61: The Case of the Missing Snacks (And the Unfortunate Suspects)
Chapter 61: The Case of the Missing Snacks (And the Unfortunate Suspects)
Elyn’s POV
Once Naviel found out that Vaelory was my maid, he calmed down a bit. The frostiness in his voice melted just enough for the air to stop feeling like winter was personally offended by my existence.
The conversation circled endlessly around how I could start working without being formally introduced to the nobles. Which meant the real problem was figuring out how I could be introduced to the nobles in the first place.
I don’t even know how long we stayed in the office. Time lost all meaning. All I knew was that when we finally reached a conclusion, I picked up my snack box only to discover—
It was empty.
There are two things wrong with my life at that moment.
First, I’m convinced someone has bewitched me.
Because explain to me why I—Elyn, a former overworked assistant—am sitting here actively planning to meet with Zorathys so we can come up with a strategy to introduce me to the nobles... so that I can work.
Shouldn’t I be grateful that Zorathys is extremely lazy and perfectly content not doing anything?
Shouldn’t that be my golden ticket out of responsibility?
But no.
My accursed sense of justice—actually, let’s call it what it is: my sense of slavery—refuses to let me ignore work that I could actually do. Even if it means cooperating with the reincarnation of Karen, also known as Zorathys.Only difference: Zorathys genuinely doesn’t care if I work or not.
Second, and most importantly...
Explain to me why my snacks—my precious snacks from Kethra—are mysteriously gone.
There is only one culprit.
"Rin," I said sweetly.
Her fur stood on end immediately. She slid closer to the window like she was preparing to leap out.
"My lady?" she asked in a tiny voice.
I smiled brightly. "Why are you moving away? Come closer."
She shook her head fast. "I’m scared of what you’ll do to me if I come closer."
Oh?
"Rin," I repeated sweetly, "come. Closer."
She swallowed hard and took the tiniest, most miserable steps I’ve ever seen in my life.
I held up the snack box. "Explain."
Now—this was the part I was oblivious to:
The office had gone completely silent.
Every other person had their eyes on me.
And they—Ignivar, Naviel, Vaelory, even Morthen—had subtly shifted toward the door.
As if ready to bolt.
But I stayed focused on Rin, who gulped audibly.
"My lady..." she began.
"If I recall," I interrupted, "just yesterday you said this box was ugly, right?"
She nodded.
"Then why did you touch it when I explicitly told you not to?"
"My lady... I only tried to get the shiny things from the box. I didn’t do anything else."
"Then why," I said slowly, "is the box empty?"
She tilted her head. "Maybe because you ate it?"
Everyone in the room inhaled sharply.
Ignivar opened the door discreetly and slipped out. Naviel followed right behind him, no longer looking like the polite, composed demon but rather a terrified one running from chaos. But I wasn’t that scary was i?
Vaelory tried to tiptoe out as well, but I stopped her.
"And where do you think you’re going?"
She froze mid-step. "Nowhere, Your Highness."
"Good. Because I need to know: you and Rin are the only ones who follow me everywhere. So how did this finish so quickly?"
"My lady—" Rin began.
"I’ve heard your answer, Rin," I said coldly.
She choked on her next breath.
"I’ll get back to you.
Now I’m speaking to Vaelory."
"Your Highness, I didn’t even know you had that box. I only found out this morning," she said quickly.
"And I only just found out it’s empty. It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours since I got it. So one of you ate it. And Rin, don’t bother claiming I ate it myself. That’s basically calling me a fool for asking who stole my snacks."
"I didn’t eat it!" Vaelory said.
"Then who?" I asked.
"You are the only person I’ve seen eating from the box," Rin said.
Vaelory smacked her arm. "Shut up. For both our sakes—shut up."
"So," I said calmly, "are you suggesting I finished it and I’m now being delusional?"
Rin clamped her mouth shut, miming a zipper.
"Open it and speak," I said, voice cold enough to freeze lava.
She unzipped the imaginary zipper immediately. "No, my lady!"
"Then who ate it?"
"I don’t know!" Vaelory said.
"Me too!" Rin insisted. "I swear on everything I’ve stolen—I didn’t eat it!"
"Morthen?" I called.
He didn’t move.
He didn’t breathe.
He didn’t blink.
He was the living embodiment of a statue having an existential crisis.
"So," I said slowly, "are you all trying to tell me there’s a thief in the castle? Someone who stole my—"
I paused.
My brain clicked at that point as I remembered something from earlier.
One of the petition scrolls mentioned ’thief of snacks.’
Could it be the same? Could there be a thief of snacks in the castle walls?
"Is there anything in the castle—or any demon—that is attracted to snacks or sweets?" I asked.
"Not that I’ve heard of," Rin said slowly. "There are demons attracted to sweets, yes, but they do not live inside the castle walls."
"Really?" I asked.
"Yes. We call them the Syrenthis. They’re snake-like demons—huge ones. All adults. We’d know instantly if one was inside the castle. The smallest Syrenthis is still enormous. You can’t miss them. They’d raid the kitchen and anywhere there are snacks making a mess of the place. If a Syrenthis had walked into your room or the office then they must have destroyed something."
I frowned. "No other demons apart from them?"
She shook her head.
So...
If the Syrenthis weren’t here...
Then who—or what—was stealing my snacks?
Morthen seeming to have recovered himself spoke up as he adjusted his glasses. "Sometimes they do not make messes, and that is if they like you but that’s very unlikely because they don’t like anyone except the king and even at that, they still wreck havoc with him."