Chapter 4

Iris did not make much of a fuss when they came to her house

"What is it?" she asked, worried "toxic waste?"

"Not this time." George reassured her.

Iris stood, looking stunned. It would not surprise her if it was toxic waste. They way they kept burying all over, hiding it, hoping that it would never come to light... she remembered well the radioactive material that Roger had dug up a few years back...

They powder was there, and George took samples of it for analysis. If the power was there, how come neither Iris nor Peter had vanished? Or if they had been, might they have been replaced by some doppelgangers? Iris reacted strangely, true. But Iris had been reacted strangely since Violet died...

Maybe he'd ask Barnabas to bite Iris and find out that way.

What about Peter who was too quiet? He went into Peter's room and found him in bed, sleeping.

That late in the day, sleeping? He lifted the covers. The boy was breathing, thankfully. But the way he was breathing... It was not normal sleep. he lifted an eyelid...

"Call an ambulance:" he told iris. "I think that he's going into a coma."

He moved away, and something in the floor caught his eye. A pretty toy. It almost looked like...

Not almost like. It was the missing Faberge egg, the one that Derek and Patterson had accused each other of stealing! They had been both innocent after all...

But how had Peter gotten it? And what did it have to do with the silvery dust and the disappearances?

He opened the egg. There were figures inside. Not the same figures he remembered seeing when Derek had opened it. There were still dancers. But there was also a jester in a motley costume.

There was a magnifying glass on the table next to Peter's bed. He used to study the new figurine.

He was shocked. He had found Roger Collins at last.

Peter was in a coma. He was not in danger. It was only that his life force was being drained. Not enough to threaten his life, but enough to rend him comatose.

Barnabas met George at the hospital, where George told him what he had found out.

"Peter had the egg. Peter might have know what happened to Patterson and the others. But in the state that he's in he cannot tell us much."

"We know enough. This jeweled toy is causing people to disappear" Barnabas opened the egg and frowned "You said that there was a jester in there, didn't you?"

"Yes."

"This is not a jester. It may be a valet. It is someone in some sort of livery."

:"Let me see."

George gave a small exclamation of surprise. "That is Patterson!"

"I guess this answers all the questions as to where they went."

'And they are draining Peter now. They might have been draining him a bit before. And Iris too. She seems so listless." And we are left with a lot of questions. How did it happen? What is this silvery dust? How can we get out people back?"

"I do not think that Peter can help us much."

"Whatever it is, what he knows we must get."

"No." Barnabas shook his head. "You are asking me to bite him, so that I can learn what he knows. I can do serious damage to him, in the state he is in."

"Not if the put the blood back. Barnabas. We need whatever scrap of information we can get."

"And if they are draining him, they can drain me through him. I'd rather do what we did with Xavier with Julia to cut off the flow."

"At this moment we need the information more."

"No. Not a child."

"Barnabas, I would not ask you if it was not so important. Call Julia, call Kenneth. Arrange for it to be done safely. But whatever scrap of information we can get, we may need."

Amy's ears burned. Nastassia had boxed them repeatedly as she went about training her in her duties as chambermaid. Nastassia could have left the training to an experienced servant, but she liked breaking recalcitrant servants.

Amy still could not understand how that could happen, how a U.S. citizen like \her could find herself reduced to slavery, in thrall to some Russian sorcerers.

Jessica had tried to explain it to her, before she was taken to serve Nastassia.

They were inside the egg, if she could believe Jessica. Those Russian aristocrats did not enjoy the U.S. where servants were so mouthy and always threatened to leave their posts. They wanted a place where servants knew their place and knew how to give good service. Where the whip could be used to make them understand when their service was less than perfect. And they had created such land, and were now recruiting servants...

Barnabas had not liked to do it. It meant hurting a child. But it needed doing, so he had done it. Also, Julia made sure that Peter was not hurt.

Peter did not talk, nor respond in any way. But Barnabas could see inside his mind.

He relived the hours that Peter had spent staring at the windowpane, seeing how the ballroom displayed itself. Dark and covered with cobwebs at first. And then one day, it was full of light, and clean, and full of life...

He did not need to ask further to know when the change had come. It had been when Derek had brought up the egg and opened it, awed to have in his hand the tsar's toy.

And he saw how Peter had looked at people and thought of how they would look in the ballroom, as a game. And then the people were in the ballroom and inside the egg.. And he liked the game very much. The egg had just been there in his bedroom one day. He did not know how. He just knew that it had to be there and that he enjoyed playing with it.

It was fascinating, but Barnabas was aware of how little of value they had learned. Peter did not know how the egg operated. It just did, and it felt right to him. And that they could not use.

Wearily he pulled out of Peter's neck. He had attacked a child, and for what? To give himself the belief that he had done something useful? To keep Julia busy?"

"Evidently the egg is the entrance point for a different dimension. And the silvery powder is needed for the transition.

"Yes. And how much better off are we for knowing it?"

"Every bit of information helps. Who knows, what you did today may give us a clue we can use later on."

He stared at her, hard. "Do you really believe it, Julia?'

"We have to. It is better than giving in to despair."

"How much better?"

"We may find the answer if we keep asking questions."

"Questions to whom? You don't think that whoever is behind this went and whispered to Peter the secret of how he or she can be defeated. This is no fairy tale where the sorcerer unwisely tells of how his destruction can be accomplished."

"I am aware that it is not." she wiped the blood off his mouth. "And I also know that you are upset and why. But..."

"But, I know. We have to try and try again. And this had to be tried, if only we know that we are not going to learn much by it" he stroked Peter's forehead. "He is going to be all right, is he?"

"You did not hurt him, if that's what you ask.. But he will not be all right until we get to whoever is draining him."

"Could we do for him what we did for Xavier?"

"I am afraid that whoever is behind him might also drain you and that I might not be able to reverse the flow this time. I'd rather go over Eliot's notes to see what he has about jeweled eggs."

"I do not like you going over those notes." Barnabas frowned. "You now what they did to Amy and Sebastian. And you have a baby you are responsible for."

"I have to, We need answers."