[utahguy]

Percilla answered, her voice no longer patrician, but small, frightened. "Papa said your business didn't concern me, but you said it did - you said that 'if the blood ever awoke, you'd return, and take up the family order'. I never forgot that." She stared at Edgar, searching for answers of dread. "What did you mean? Mama and Papa forbade me to ask about the 'family order'. What did they mean? And about 'the blood awakening?'"

Edgar gave a sinister smile, his facial lines confirming his desire.

Though her spirit was weakened by the sudden rush of nefarious memories, she managed a meager whisper, “Locket? Order? I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes you do,” Edgar hissed,” in a way that made her blue blood run cold. “Now please give me the locket.”

Oh, this was going much, much too fast. Her mind flashed to Thurgood and Eason, hoping beyond hope that they would suddenly appear, the duel Dandies as she had on countless times teasingly called them, with their perfumed continence, manner and speak, two who would pluck her from this nightmare and bring her back to her sheltered existence as she had known since her privileged birth.

Eason’s abrupt “ahem” broke her gossamer wishes.

“The locket,” he said, with impatience in his gravely voice. “Now.”

[Old Sarge]

Percilla's fear and dread, reawakened after all these intervening years by Uncle Edgar's arrival, threatened to come busrting out of her throat in a scream of fright but, before the cry could emerge, it was dampened by something else. Curiosity. Yes, she did remember the stories and the tales, and the single talk that she and Edgar had all those years past. And in the back of her mind, she always wished for the answers. Now, here on a dark and stormy night, her questions could finally be answered, by the only relative left alive who could.

"Mother gave me the locket, Uncle Edgar," she said finally, her voice regaining strength as she spoke, "and it's the most precious thing I have of hers. Will you damage it?"

"Hardly, my dear", Edgar said, "but the locket itself is only sentimental - the true value is the key within. Now, will we see the key, and could we please do so, over by the fireside, and out of this weather?"

Percilla, slowly, allowed the gaunt man inside and over the threshold, and got the impression that by inviting him in, her life would change forever. Edgar crossed the room to the hearth, and basked for a minute in its inviting warmth. Percilla saw that his hair, the same color as her mother's, was wind-tossed and wiry; his skin was reddened from the wind; all having the effect of rough-hewn wood.

"Ah, so much better, thank you, Cilla", Edgar said. "Now then, the locket, and watch closely..."

Percilla produced the locket from around her neck, and handed it over reluctanly, coming closer to watch. Edgar held it to the light for a moment, as if examining it for something. Then, with a curious motion, he twisted the locket with a tiny click, and a hollow space was inside.

The locket lay in Edgar's hand, now in two pieces: the lid had an elaborate etching on the inside, a coat of arms, from first glance. But in the bottom half, lay not a key, but a single pewter peg, almost the size of a nail.

"That? That's a key?" Percilla asked. "It looks nothing like any key I've ever seen."

"Of course not, because you haven't seen many keys, have you?" Edgar snickered. "Not everything is obvious - this might not look like a normal key, but what is a key, but a device to open a lock, and it matches the lock itself, and not your preconcieved views. Your first lesson of many, darling niece!"

"But, it couldn't fit any door in the house, or anywhere!"

"Doors! Keys don't always open doors, either. They open locks, Cilla, and this key fits into a lock which, I daresay, hasn't turned since I left this manor. But tonight, it surely shall."