At the top of the staircase, she lifted the lantern shutter to reveal a burning candle, and the group began a descent into the darkness, keeping their hands on the jittery, loose banister.
Her face tight with worry, she led both men through the doorway, passing shelves of f lour, sugar, and other baking ingredients on her way toward the abandoned cellar. The woman tried to encourage him to hurry but received only a sullen grumbling about arthritis on a cold night. A scraggly, aged man climbed down from his perch, one mud-crusted boot at a time sliding into its foothold and landing less than gracefully upon the ground. Meanwhile the maid had rushed toward the driver in the wagon seat and gestured for him to follow her inside.
A loud squeak echoed into the stillness as he pulled his hands away from the door, satisfied the gap was wide enough. Finally, the harsh brush of sliding splinters overcame the friction. The footman put his back and shoulder strength into opening an old storage-room door. Two servants slipped from the shadows, a bearded footman and a wiry kitchen maid with a shuttered lantern in her hand. A rickety old wagon, its simple board bed held together with rusty screws, pulled up against the back of the palace.
The sound of squeaking wheels grew louder, as did the clicking of horse hooves scraping across cobblestones.
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