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with a look of disbelief. "I don't want any of that knight stuff, especially around this bunch. Remember how impressive they looked with Fluffy chasing after them?" he pointed out.
    Pat frowned. "To be fair, Fluffy isn't as cuddly as his name," she countered.
    Fred shrugged. "I still wouldn't want to join them."
    "Then you'll go through with your idea to apprentice yourself to a blacksmith or tanner?" Pat guessed.
    "I don't know, I'll think about it later. Right now I wanted to ask you if you heard about the fireworks they're putting on for you tonight," Fred told her.
    Pat glanced down at the floor and nodded her head. There was a sigh on her lips. "Yes, I was told."
    Fred's heart beat like a war drum before an epic battle. "Did you want to go with me to see them?" Pat shook her head; his heart sank. "Why not?"
    "King Stephen ordered me to stay in the castle, and I must obey him."
    Frank scowled, but an idea hit him. He leaned in and dropped his voice. "What were his exact words to you about leaving?"
    Pat frowned and raised an eyebrow. "He said I couldn't pass the front gates."
    A sly smile slid onto Fred's face. "You can't pass the front gates?"
    The girl was suspicious of him. "That's what I said." She leaned back and gave him a careful examination. "You look too much like Ned. What are you thinking?" Fred pulled out the piece of metal and handed it to her. She turned it over in her hands and frowned. "What's this?"
    "You're way out of the castle and into a little fun," Fred replied.
    "Or trouble," she added.
    Fred waved off her worries. "It just leads to a tunnel beneath the castle, and that'll take us outside. That way you won't have to pass through the front gates and disobey the king."
    Pat's face fell. "I don't think that's the spirit in which King Stephen made his order."
    The boy rolled his eyes, grabbed her hand and pulled her up with him. He nodded down at her dress. "You really want to be wearing that stuff the last night you have to be yourself?" He gestured to the room. "And stay here with nothing to do but sit here watching the fireworks all the way down there and then going to dinner with a bunch of stuffy people?"
    Pat bit her lip. "No, but I don't know. Are you sure this will get us out of the castle?"
    Fred frowned and swiped the metal from her hand. He teasingly waived it in front of her and backed up toward the door. "If that's how you're going to be than I'll just go exploring all by myself." Like hell he was going to do that, but Pat took up the challenge.
    "Oh no, you're not. You'll probably need somebody to get you out of that trouble," she scolded. She stomped over to a dresser and pulled out her old clothes. Fred blushed and swung around while she quickly changed, and in a moment she looped her arm through the crook of his own and pulled him toward the door. "All right, Mr. Adventurer, where is this secret tunnel?"
    Fred smirked; this was the Pat he knew.

CHAPTER 5
     
    Fred led Pat downstairs and down the same corridors Hawkins had led them on their first entrance into the castle. He remembered they'd passed the kitchen at one point, and in a few minutes they came to the cooking room. Unfortunately the area was alive with men and women hurrying to prepare the night's feast, though that didn't stop Fred from looking for the stove. He found a group of them lined up on the wall on the opposite side of the room from where they stood. Fred noticed there was a small gap about two feet by two feet between the last stove and the corner. He just knew that had to be the secret entrance. Now the only problem lay in getting through it unnoticed.
    Pat and Fred pulled back, and he crossed his arms over his chest in thought. "The secret entrance is in that far corner, but I don't know how we're going to get through them without being seen."
    Pat looked around for an answer and her eyes lit on a large rat hole close at hand. She saw two beady eyes staring back at her, and an idea hit her. She crept past Fred and