§ § § -- September 29, 2004

If Christian had been lucid enough to think about his situation, he would have described it as "floating in the twilight zone". He could remember fairly clearly, and to drown out the voices jabbering in some strange staccato tongue, he went over and over the last few events that had occurred before he'd lost track of time and space.

The triplets' appointment had gone just about as he'd expected it to go. All three babies had checked up with flying colors, and they'd received their next scheduled round of routine vaccinations with the usual wailing of protest and pain. Dr. Corbett, seeing that he had come alone, had helped him carry the triplets out to the car and secure them in their car seats; then she'd bid him goodbye and he had started out of the hospital parking lot, his intention to return to the main house.

But he'd never even gotten close. Just about to make the right-hand turn onto the Ring Road, he'd been startled by three figures dressed in black jumpsuits, faces covered but for the eyes. Two had climbed into the back of the wagon behind the triplets, while the third slammed himself into the passenger seat, thrust a gun at Christian and ordered him to turn left and keep driving until told otherwise. He'd wanted to protest, but the sight of the gun barrel had kept him quiet.

Christian's mind had raced madly all the way down the Ring Road. He'd passed the access road to the Enclave, glanced up it as if hoping he could go home and gotten a jab in the temple with the gun for his effort. In the end he had wound up driving halfway around the island, all the way to the western end and around it before being told to stop at the side of the road. There they'd changed drivers and one of the two in the back had tied a black scarf over Christian's eyes so that he couldn't see where they were going. The car had then moved forward once more, first along pavement, then down some bumpy road, and finally come to a stop. He had been told to get out, and he'd heard the sounds of the triplets being taken from their car seats before the command came to "Walk now!"

The one with the gun had prodded Christian in the back with it; with his companions preceding them so that Christian would have less success at trying to escape, they'd all gone inside and up a flight of stairs. Then the one with the gun had barked out an order in whatever language they spoke. Christian had been seized with a painfully strong grip and made to stand still while someone stuck a needle in his arm and held him for several minutes till whatever they gave him had taken effect. He felt a pleasant wooziness steal over him, then blacked out.

Since that time he'd floated in and out of consciousness, and if he was left alone long enough, he sometimes even had a chance to think a bit, as he did now. Physically he felt pretty good; mentally he was vaguely suspicious of the feeling. Sounds floated all around him; he seemed to be floating among them, amidst the strange jabbering language he kept hearing—a tumbling jumble of vowels that nevertheless sounded oddly familiar to him somehow, interspersed with skipping and sometimes elided consonants. Now and then he heard something recognizable; one of them seemed to be named Lisa, though the accent on the first vowel was oddly prolonged. From time to time he heard the sounds of babies cooing or crying, and in response there would be a woman's voice cooing back.

Christian opened his eyes and tried to turn his head, but it spun on him unexpectedly and he snapped his eyes shut again. He'd been thinking in jordiska, because for some reason the effort required to think in English was more than he had the energy to muster up. But if he meant to communicate with these people, he'd have to do it.

"My babies," he muttered. It totally drained him, but it got results. Someone gasped, and he heard an urgent command in that odd language; then a sting pierced his arm. His last thought was a curse in jordiska before he lost all awareness once more.

§ § § -- September 30, 2004

By now it was common knowledge around this end of the island that Christian and the triplets were missing, and through the morning quite a few of Roarke's many employees found some excuse to stop in at the main house and express their hopes that they'd be found soon. After the first few instances of this, Roarke took the opportunity to question people, trying to find out if they had seen anything unusual, anyone suspicious or just something out of place. Naturally, no one had, and Leslie's depression and fear grew apace.

Mid-morning, Maureen came in. "No word?" she asked.

"Nothing," Leslie replied through a shaky sigh.

"Well, this might help," Maureen told her, sitting in front of Roarke's desk. Leslie set aside a stack of mail, and Roarke looked up from his account ledger. "I took Brianna to school this morning, since I wanted to get a few groceries in town on the way back. But when I got out of our driveway, I looked over at your house for some reason, and I saw something stuck in the door. I had Brianna go get it for me." She handed Leslie an envelope. "It could be that ransom note we were talking about yesterday."

Leslie grabbed a letter opener and slit the envelope, then pulled out a sheet of folded paper. It was handwritten, and she read it out loud with occasional difficulty. "We have decided that now is the ideal time to reveal ourselves. We are the ones who attempted to take you out at the castle in Lilla Jordsö. Though we lost our devoted sisters, we did not give up. And now on Fantasy Island, we have succeeded. We took Prince Christian and your three babies yesterday, and we are holding them until we can get away from here. But we wanted you to know who has robbed you of your happiness, as you came and stole ours, as you stole our father, our oldest brother, and then our mother's sanity. Now you will suffer as we have suffered these last fourteen years. Signed, Antti, Niilo and Liisa Komainen."

By the time she finished reading, she was shaking violently enough that the paper fell out of her hands and to the floor. She stared at Roarke and whispered, "I was right…I knew it was them. I knew it."

Roarke took a slow, deep breath, released it, then said, "Maureen, would you hand me the page, please." Maureen retrieved it and gave it to him, and he read over it once or twice. Finally he said, "They don't say what their plans are once they make their attempt at escape. You say, Maureen, that this was stuck in the door?"

Maureen nodded. "Brianna didn't have much trouble pulling it out. I'm surprised it didn't fall out. We never would've seen it if it had, I think."

"If, as they say, they are holding Christian and the infants, it will mean they will have to have formula and diapers for the children at the very least," Roarke noted, folding the sheet of paper. "I think, Leslie, you may feel better if you can do a little investigating. When you go to the post office, you might consider stopping at the grocery and asking the clerks and others there if they happen to remember anyone making unusually large purchases of baby paraphernalia—not only diapers and formula, but also bottles and other such things."

Leslie nodded, visibly trying to gather herself. "God only knows what they're doing to Christian," she whispered, swallowing hard, then opening her eyes. "And I wish there were some way to find out where they are."

"We will," Maureen said firmly. "Sooner or later they'll make a mistake and it'll undo their whole scheme. Don't forget, if you need something, just let me know." She stood up, then rolled her eyes. "What a dope I am. Mr. Roarke, could I borrow your phone for a minute? I need to call someone."

"By all means, Maureen," Roarke agreed, and Maureen punched out a number, then asked for someone named Pualani. Put on hold, she grinned at Leslie. "I borrowed a book from her, and I need to take it back so she can read it too. When she lent it to me, she said it was great for getting lost in some other world. Said it helped her drown out the strange noises her weird neighbors were making."

"Weird neighbors?" Leslie echoed, half grinning. "What makes them weird?"

"Heck if I know," said Maureen, chuckling. About to say more, she cut herself off and spoke into the phone. "Hi, Pualani, it's Maureen. When's good for you to have visitors? I just wanted to bring back that book I borrowed." She paused, then said, "Okay, sure…this afternoon sounds great. What time do you get off work?" She made the arrangements, then hung up, thanked Roarke and laid a hand on Leslie's shoulder. "Good luck."

"Thanks for your help, Maureen," Leslie said, and Maureen smiled and left. Roarke, absently turning the folded page over in his fingers, looked up.

"While you're in town," he said, "you might wish to turn this over to the police station. They can contact the police in Lilla Jordsö so that they can make a positive identification of the two women who were killed there."

"Good idea," Leslie murmured. "I have something I want to ask anyway."

After picking up some packages at the post office, she went to the police station and handed over the note; the sheriff was in and looked it over, frowning. "Do you know these people, Miss Leslie?" he asked.

"Yes," Leslie said. "They're the younger siblings of my late first husband."

The sheriff looked up sharply, his face disbelieving. "How did it get down to this?"

"I hope you have some time, Sheriff, because it's a long story," Leslie said with a weary sigh, taking a wooden chair in front of the man's desk and launching into the explanation of her marriage to Teppo, his siblings' and mother's animosity toward her, and their constant taunting and belittling of her. The sheriff listened intently, nodding now and then, frowning when she told him what had happened in Lilla Jordsö. "Now," she concluded, "even though two of the sisters are dead, they came here anyway and kidnapped Christian and the triplets sometime yesterday—probably twoish, I'd estimate, since the babies had a doctor's appointment and Christian took them over. They never came back from that."

The sheriff had been making notes as she spoke; now he looked up. "We'll do some questioning around here and see if anyone's been picking up a lot of baby stuff, especially strangers. It's not such a big island that too many unknowns would drop in here, and your father's guests don't need to frequent anything other than maybe the café, the post office and the gift shop. Can you describe them for me?"

"If you bear with me," Leslie said, inspiration hitting her, "I can give you a picture of Teppo, the one I was married to. The whole family has most of the same facial features—they all have gray eyes, very lean jaws and cleft chins, and they have straight blonde hair. And they're all on the slender side, or at least they were when I knew them."

"That'll be a big help," the sheriff said. "I'll hold the questioning till you can get us the picture." He grinned and added jocularly, "You'd make a pretty fair detective."

"I doubt that," Leslie said with a chuckle. "I'm just lucky enough to have most of the information at hand. I'll be back as soon as I can with that picture." She hesitated a moment in the midst of rising. "Incidentally…I was wondering. Are you allowed to tell me what was stolen from the hospital?"

The sheriff glanced up and shrugged. "It's not classified information, if that's what you're asking. They took a lot of vials, but it turned out to be only a couple of different drugs altogether, after the staff took inventory. They took morphine and something called atropine, whatever that is."

"Oh," Leslie mumbled, rubbing her stomach, which felt as though it had just been flash-frozen. "Thanks." She left the office, thinking maybe she should call the Ordoñezes and see if they could tell her anything about this atropine stuff.

‡ ‡ ‡

Maureen pulled to a stop in front of the building where Pualani lived with her family, glancing around the area. Last year's fire had been a blessing in disguise; the new overseer's house was much more modern and better built than the original had been, and the apartment buildings Roarke had insisted be erected for the local field workers and their families were also high-quality. Pualani, who had grown up in the fishing village, had remarked that it was the nicest place she had ever lived in, and that she especially liked it because now she had space for bookcases to hold her beloved books.

Maureen tapped on the door of her friend's apartment, and Pualani opened it almost immediately, brightening. "Hi, Maureen, come in!" she said, and Maureen grinned at her, slipping inside. The apartment was somewhat sparsely furnished, but immaculate and decorated with family photos and curtains in cheerful colors. This time, Maureen noticed, there were dolls of all sorts strewn around—baby dolls, Barbie dolls and rag dolls, along with a few Bratz dolls. "Oh no, you bought her those bratty things?" Maureen groaned playfully. "They're the only doll my Brianna will even look at."

"I don't know why," Pualani remarked in the same spirit. "They look kind of ugly to me." Both women laughed and sat down at the kitchen table, in a little nook created by a bow window that provided a view of a playground for children, backdropped by the jungle and a partial view of Mount Tutumoa. "How about a little tea?"

Maureen agreed, and in a few minutes they were sipping from tumblers and discussing the book Maureen was returning. They got engrossed enough that the sound of Pualani's baby son crying came as a surprise to them, and they both laughed and went back to the bedroom the children shared. "There's my baby boy," Pualani crooned, lifting the infant from the crib. "Time to eat, huh? Come on, Ethan."

"I still think he's the cutest thing," Maureen remarked. "What does Arielle think of him? Does she get jealous?"

"No, not really. Actually, she loves to help feed him," Pualani said with a grin. She took Ethan back out to the kitchen and prepared his bottle while Maureen held him; just as both women noticed that Pualani's daughter was missing, the door opened and the little girl came in brandishing a dirty white shoe that looked like the sort worn by a nurse.

"Look what I found, Mommy!" she crowed.

Pualani scolded, "Arielle, where'd you get that?"

"In the hall," the child said. "There's a whole buncha shoes in the hallway. Maybe those people forgot and left them."

"Oh dear, it's those strange neighbors of ours," Pualani groaned.

Maureen laughed. "If they're going to leave their shoes in the hallway, they should expect someone to come along and help themselves. Say, Arielle, how about you and I go and put the shoe back, okay?"

Arielle looked surprised. "Why?"

"Because that's not your shoe, Arielle," Pualani said, "and those people will want it back. Give the shoe to Mrs. Harding, so you can come help me feed Ethan."

Reluctantly Arielle handed Maureen the shoe and scampered into the kitchen. Pualani came out with the bottle and peered at Maureen in surprise. "Something wrong?"

"I was just looking at this…" Maureen mumbled, staring at the sole of the shoe. Its tread consisted of narrow, crowded horizontal lines from one end to the other—and just near the edge of the heel was a small, ragged-edged hole, as if the shoe's owner had stepped on a nail. Dark mud was embedded in the grooves between each and every ridge.

"Someone's been playing in the dirt," Pualani remarked jokingly.

"Yeah," Maureen agreed, scowling at the shoe. The Enstads' dirt, I'll bet! She let Pualani take Ethan, barely noticing the action. "Uh…Arielle, honey, where was this shoe again?"

"In the hall," said Arielle. "With lots of other ones."

Pualani said, "Come on, Arielle—you and I and Mrs. Harding are going to take that shoe back to its owners. Let's go." Arielle, looking disappointed, trailed Maureen and Pualani out; Pualani continued to feed Ethan while Maureen carried the shoe. In front of the next-door apartment—where, sure enough, there were two pairs of shoes lined up against the wall beside the door, along with a single shoe that was clearly the mate of the one Arielle had appropriated—Pualani urged Arielle to knock on the door; the child did so with more enthusiasm than was strictly warranted.

It took almost a full minute for the door to open; inside they could hear a baby fussing. A skinny young man with a sharp jaw and lank blond hair peered out at them. "Yes?"

"Go on, Arielle," Pualani prompted.

Arielle said meekly, "I'm sorry I took your shoe, mister."

"What?" the young man said, looking confused.

Maureen displayed the shoe at him. "She noticed the shoes in the hall here and didn't realize they belonged to someone. We just wanted to see that it was returned."

"Oh…" The young man seemed distracted, glancing back over his shoulder before he said, "That's my sister's shoe. Thanks for bringing it back." He leaned into the hallway to take it from Maureen, and it was then that she saw the characteristic cleft chin she recalled seeing in the photo of Teppo. Barely controlling her reaction, she handed the shoe back.

"Sounds hectic in there," Pualani remarked conversationally.

The young man started, then nodded. "Oh yes…sister just had a baby…I must help feed it. Well, thank you again, goodbye." With that he shut the door on them.

"Bye, mister," said Arielle a beat late. She looked up at her mother in consternation. "I wanted to ask if I could help feed their baby."

"Maybe some other time," Pualani said, grinning. "Come on, let's go take care of Ethan first." She led the way back to their apartment.

Inside, Maureen tried to hold her composure till Pualani had sent Arielle to her room with her dolls; then she blurted, "I need to use the phone—is it all right?"

"Of course…but is there something wrong?" Pualani asked.

"Not if I can get through to Mr. Roarke. That's one of the people who kidnapped Leslie's husband and babies. I recognized him when he stuck his head out to get the shoe. He has the same facial features as Leslie's first husband who died. The baby we heard crying in there has to be one of the triplets!"

Pualani, dumbfounded at first, gasped suddenly. "Then hurry, Maureen, make all the phone calls you need to! Oh, I hope they don't realize you know who they are!"

‡ ‡ ‡

Christian had been lying quietly, trying to pretend he was still under the effects of the drug they'd been giving him. He didn't feel quite back to normal, but he was alert enough to process what he heard around him. One of the triplets was crying intermittently, and the voices were still nattering in their odd language; he managed to pick out two males and a female. Perhaps that's the one they call Lisa, with their strange accent. Though their vowels sound rather like… At that moment he realized what language he was hearing. It's Finnish, that's what it is. Finnish? What a peculiar language to hear on this island… And that was when he realized exactly whose hands he and the babies had fallen into.

His eyes popped open at precisely the same moment there came a knock on the door. There were startled exclamations, and Christian watched the three of them argue in frantic whispers before the largest figure shoved one of the others and gave a command. The slight male got up to answer the door; Christian stared, undetected as yet because his captors' attention was devoted to the possibility of being discovered.

"Yes?" asked the young man at the door. It was the first English Christian had heard since initially coming to. Someone said something on the other side of the door, and the young man said blankly, "What?"

As the encounter progressed, Christian wondered if he dared call out or at least sit up. He wasn't sure he had enough strength to make a break for it; and anyway, he didn't want to leave the triplets with these people. About to chance sitting, he was thwarted when the young man suddenly yanked back and closed the door, returning with a shoe in his hand. A new conversation in Finnish ensued, and after a moment or two the voices got frantic. All three jumped up—the woman with one of the babies in her arms—and started out of the room. Christian watched them disappear into one of the bedrooms; then, hoping hard, he pushed himself into a seated position on the floor and tried to get to his feet. He was still dizzy, though, and decided he'd better settle for crawling.

He had almost reached the remaining babies, had gotten close enough to recognize Tobias and Karina, when a sharp male voice demanded, "What are you doing, prince?"

Christian, startled, lost his balance and landed sitting. "Who the hell are you," he demanded, "that you've abducted me and my children? What do you want with us?"

The woman appeared with Susanna in her embrace; the baby was fretting, and Christian recognized it as the onset of hunger. "It's not exactly necessary that you know, but we may as well explain it to you, because you won't live through the night." Christian gawked at her, frozen by horror and disbelief, while she handed Susanna off to the man beside her and went to the big nylon bag that sat on the floor nearby. "It's not quite you or the babies we're targeting, but your wife. She was once married to our oldest brother, and she killed him; so we want revenge."

"Leslie didn't kill your brother," Christian contradicted.

"Shut up!" the woman screeched, and immediately all three triplets began to howl. With shaking arms Christian reached out and lifted Karina, who was closest, trying to calm her down. "Damn you, Antti, can't you quiet that child?" She turned back to her bag and went on, "You see, Prince Christian, we can't let you live, because then you'd try to get your children back. And we simply can't allow that." She came up with a syringe and a vial, and Christian wished he had the strength to grab Tobias, get up, wrest Susanna from the woman and run. As it was, all he could do was sit there, try to keep a grip on Karina with his weakened muscles, and watch the woman fill her syringe and approach him. "Someone came here from the apartment next to this one, and Niilo could see he had been recognized. Now we have to make our escape while we're still free to do it. So as soon as I've emptied this syringe into your arm, we're going to take the infants and get the next charter off this island—and meanwhile, you'll remain behind to die."

Christian tried to twist away, but the woman caught him and clutched him with the iron grip he still recalled from the initial injection. "But for fate's sake, why? Why are you going to kill me and take the babies? Why haven't you dealt with Leslie?"

"You ask too many questions, prince," the woman complained, pushing the needle into his arm. Christian winced, wondering how much knockout drug was in the thing. "But you might like to know what you'll die of. I've been giving you morphine all along, just to keep you quiet and under control. I could have killed you with that, but it seems too much like a bad murder mystery…too easy. You'll die of atropine instead."

"What the hell is…" Christian began, only to forget what he wanted to say when his mouth went dry and began to burn. A debilitating thirst overcame him. "What is this?" he finally demanded, gasping.

The woman tossed aside the empty syringe and relieved him of his daughter. "It's usually used just prior to anesthesia in hospitals. I'm a nurse, luckily for our cause, so I know my drugs. My name is Liisa Komainen, and there watching you is my oldest living brother, Antti. My other brother is Niilo. We all loved our brother Teppo, and Antti was especially close to him. When that bitch you married killed him, we knew we had to get our revenge on her. Soon we'll finally achieve that goal, and Leslie Hamilton will suffer for the rest of her days, exactly as we've suffered ever since she killed our father and brother."

"She never…" Christian began and was shocked to find that he now had trouble speaking. "Need…wadah…"

Antti laughed, rocking Susanna, who had begun to calm down. "You're not likely to live long enough to care if you get any water, prince. Besides, you wouldn't be able to swallow it anyway—try it." Christian's horror and panic increased when he discovered the man was right. The stuff was working pretty quickly on him, and he wondered frantically if he'd even live long enough to watch these monsters abscond with his children.

"We need to get out of here now," Liisa said, standing up. "Niilo, are you ready? I've given the prince the poison—we have to leave now if we have any hope of getting away!"

"Where did you hide the car?" Antti asked, as if inquiring where he'd left his jacket.

"In the trees. If we walk very quickly we can get there and on the road to the dock before the alarm can go out." Niilo appeared from the bedroom and peered in at Christian, who was squinting painfully in the sunlit room. "Is he going blind, Liisa?"

"No, he'll simply wish he were. His pupils won't contract," she said. "Now, Niilo, we can't stall any longer. Get that baby off the floor and let's leave."

"I'll drive," Antti said. "Give me the keys, Niilo, and Liisa, you make sure the babies are strapped in properly. You can wrap them in the blankets on the way."

Christian's vision was blurred as well as overwhelmed by the light, and he could barely see enough to watch them leave with his daughters and son. Once more he tried to get up, but the morphine lingered in his system, adding its effects to the advancing symptoms of atropine poisoning. Panting, squinting, burning up, slowly succumbing to a combination of panic and a creeping sense of madness brought on by the drug, Christian toppled over onto the floor, his last coherent thought a flash of pleading to Leslie before his mind was no longer his own.