Sleep did not come easy for Claire that night. Every time she closed her eyes and began to drift off, she imagined a battlefield covered in dead bodies, Draz and Alek lost somewhere in the carnage. She kept seeing their blank, lifeless eyes and mouths frozen open in silent screams, cold and unmoving as she called their names over and over again.

Each time she jerked back awake, her heart pounding in her chest as she scrambled to light the oil lamp resting on the nightstand beside the bed. The warm yellow glow was enough to temporarily chase away her fears, but she couldn't sleep with the lamp lit and each time she doused the light, the thoughts slowly crept back, determined to plague her.

Thunder rumbled overhead reminding Claire of the storm that still raged outside. The only other sounds in the room besides the steady pattering of rain against the window panes, was the crackling of the fire in the hearth, and the rhythmic tick-tock of the mechanical clock on the mantle.

Extinguishing the lamp for the third time that night, Claire lay back down and dragged the covers over her body. She tried to burrow as deeply into the comfortable warmth as she could manage. Just as she began drifting off to sleep, a loud, insistent pounding sound jerked her back into a state of wakefulness even more disorienting than being startled by a dream.

She lay there for several seconds, her heart hammering in her chest. Had she actually heard a sound, or was her mind playing tricks on her?

Pushing herself upright, Claire heard it again. A loud pounding sound, like someone was banging their fist against a piece of wood -- or a door. Rising once more, Claire grabbed a robe draped over the back of the chair by the fireplace and slipped it on.

She pulled open the bedroom door just as Alek swept by.

"What's going on?" Claire asked, reaching out to catch his arm. He stopped and looked towards her. His expression looked anxious.

"It's nothing," he assured her as another series of bangs broke the heavy silence. "Go back to sleep." He placed a brief kiss against her forehead and hurried off towards the stairs. Moments later, the other doors began to open one by one, first Draz, and then Arabella, both of whom looked as though they'd been dead asleep before the disturbance.

Lucky them. Claire thought with a light sigh.

"What's going on?" Arabella asked, sounding annoyed.

"Sounds like someone is trying to bash the door in," Draz replied.

"Alek said it was nothing," Claire replied, believing the words even less after saying them for a second time.

"Right," Draz replied. He looked skeptical as well. "Since when is anything involving that idiot, nothing?" He abandoned the doorway and started for the stairs. Claire followed, unable to find an argument to pit against him. Draz was right, when it came to Alek, the situation rarely amounted to 'nothing'.

They'd just reached the top of the landing when they heard angry shouts and the sound of glass shattering. Draz practically flew down the stairs, fire dancing between his fingers. Claire was close on his heels.

The foyer was crowded with six me dressed in dark green cloaks pinned up on one shoulder by a silver brooch in the shape of a bear. Alek stood at the base of the stairs, his hands raised. The floor was littered with pieces of painted glass, torn rose petals and broken stems. The table that had once held the ornate vase lay overturned on the floor. Whether it was the result of a struggle, or just lack of space and general disregard was uncertain.

"You will have your time to speak with his majesty, Lord Drosselmeyer, but if you continue to resist our orders, you will be doing so from a jail cell," one of the men was saying.

"Alek?" Claire managed at last.

His gaze flickered towards the stairs and he scowled.

"I thought I told you to stay upstairs," Alek snapped.

"What's going on, Alek?" Claire asked, ignoring his comment.

"Nothing. Draz, get her out of here now."

Claire felt Draz's hand wrap gently around her forearm. "We should listen to him, Claire," he whispered. Before either of them could move, the men parted and a tall, broad shouldered figure stepped into view.

"Your mother would be so disappointed, that vase was a family heirloom," Ephraim Drosselmeyer declared in a bored tone that rivaled that of his son.

Claire saw Alek visibly cringe when his father stepped into view.

"What is the meaning of this?" Alek demanded to know, "What gives you the right to break into my home in the middle of the night?"

"Rest assured, Alek, regardless of our personal relationship, my presence here is strictly business and you would do well to remember that," he said, his eyes rising to the stairs. When his gaze settled on her, Claire shrank back and Draz put a protective arm around her shoulder. "It has recently come to the attention of the king that there are dissenters in the capital, those that wish to see him dethroned."

"It took you and six men to deliver these concerns?" Alek replied. "I fail to see what this has to do with me."

"The king believes you to be a traitor, Alek, he believes you have turned your back on the crown and on all that Oria stands for," Ephraim continued, his voice rumbling louder than the thunder. "I told him he was mistaken, that the Drosselmeyer family have been loyal to the Desimir family for hundreds of years. I assured him I would look into the matter personally and I can only assume that you are harboring these suspected terrorists under false pretenses."

"They're not terrorists," Alek insisted to which his father smiled. It was a cold expression, one that left Claire feeling incredibly uneasy.

"Then they should have no problem coming with me," he concluded quietly. "If they are innocent, they will be released. If you turn them over to me now, the king will be at ease knowing his favored adviser has not become his greatest threat."

Alek shook his head in disgust, a smirk slowly working its way onto his face. "You are truly despicable," he said, "I'm ashamed to call you father."

"Don't worry, son, the feeling is mutual," Ephraim replied coolly. "Take the woman," Ephraim instructed, his voice cool. He pulled a pair of what appeared to be tinted glasses down over his eyes. "Kill anyone who resists."

The six men rushed forward, crashing into the stairs like a wave against the shore. Flashes of light filled the room, blinding them and making it difficult to see.

"Run, Claire," Draz hissed, half-dragging, half-guiding her back up the stairs.

"Where are we going to go?" Claire gasped.

"Up," Draz explained.

Up? That didn't make any sense! The highest up they could go was the tower. After that they would be trapped.

Unless, Draz expected them to jump.

Claire felt her stomach twist into unpleasant knots.

As she had come to discover since arriving in Oria, she would do a lot of things, but there was no way she was jumping off the roof of that tower.

Before she could offer any sort of protest, a loud crash drew both of their attention towards the end of the hall. Two of the men had broken free of the conflict below and were now walking towards them.

In the hands of one officer was what appeared to be a pistol, the end of which was glowing bright green. The other officer had what appeared to be a bullwhip, the entire length was pulsating with a vicious red light.

The man with the pistol smirked and angled his weapon at them. "Surrender," he demanded. Draz pushed Claire behind him and continued backing up slowly. "Lord Drosselmeyer says we only need the girl alive. You might want to take that into consideration before you do anything stupid, Haval."

"Ahah! So you do know me!" Draz exclaimed proudly, a wide grin forming on his face. "Then you also know that stupid is what I do best." His expression shifted, his eyes growing dark. His hand swept upwards and fire spiraled out from between his fingers, looping and twisting through the air towards the two men who had since stopped their approach. The one wielding the bullwhip dove into the nearest open doorway to avoid the approaching firestorm. The other dove forward instead, rolling beneath the flames and back to his feet in one, practiced motion.

"I know you," he said with a smirk, "and you're going to have to do--"

His words were cut short by a flurry of what appeared to be cards streaming from Claire's open doorway, swooping and spiraling through the air like a flock of angry birds. The man whimpered beneath the assault, arms raised to protect his face which was covered in dozens of tiny cuts.

"Claire..." Draz questioned, looking towards her, "are those my cards?"

Claire could only shrug helplessly. "I swear I left them right where I found them, I don't know how... or why..."

"We have to go," Draz insisted, pulling her back towards the stairs that would bring them to Alek's tower room. "Come on, we'll discuss this later."

"How are we going to get out from up here?" Claire asked once they were in the relative safety of the room.

"You'll see. Help me move these," he grunted as he began to grab the edges of the multitude of rugs covering the floor and drag them away. Claire did as he asked and as the rugs were cleared away she saw what appeared to be a trap door. Had they come all the way up here, only to go back down again?

"Now, we have to find the switch," Draz said, his gaze sweeping the room.

"A switch?"

"Yeah, it could be anything," Draz said quietly. "Alek wasn't very specific when he mentioned it to me. I guess he never thought we'd have to actually resort to this."

"Resort to what?" Claire asked.

"Is there an echo in here...?" Draz teased as he knocked stacks of books aside in his pursuit of the mysterious switch. "Escaping of course."

Right, of course, why hadn't she thought of that?

Their search was interrupted by the sound of footsteps pounding up the stairs. Draz sprang forward, putting himself between Claire and the doorway. Fire flicked to life between his fingers as he readied himself for a fight.

The heavy footfalls grew louder and seconds later Alek came bursting through the door. He looked tired, but uninjured. Claire rushed around Draz and threw her arms around Alek. He pulled her close, holding her tightly.

"Are you hurt?" he asked.

"No, I'm fine," she replied, her fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt. "Are you?"

"Never been better," he replied quietly. He held her for a few seconds more before releasing her with some obvious reluctance. "We don't have much time, they'll send more men."

"I'm fine, thanks for asking," Draz called flippantly as he continued his search.

"Why do they think I'm a spy?" Claire asked. "How do they even know I'm here?"

"I can only guess Sevik has something to do with this," Alek replied, stepping around Claire and towards the back of the room. "He must known by now that he didn't get the real nutcracker. He's going to do whatever he can to stop me, stop us, from restoring the prince."

He reached for the chain on a small wall mounted lamp and pulled. The light remained on, but the floor began to rumble beneath their feet. Then it began to move.

Well, it began to rotate around what Claire had earlier presumed was a trap door of some sort.

"Really? The pull string? I'm disappointed in you, Alek, I thought you were more creative than that," Draz replied with a roll of his eyes.

As the room rotated, the roof began to open, exposing the room and those within it to the storm raging outside. Within seconds they were soaked through, the rain coming down in thick sheets and the wind whipping wildly around them.

"Are you sure this is a good idea, Alek?" Draz asked. "I mean, I know our options are limited, but this is borderline suicide..."

"Do you have any better ideas?" Alek asked.

"No," Draz replied. "Didn't hurt to ask though, did it?"

"What is going on?" Claire asked, having to raise her voice over the sound of the rain pounding down around them.

"It's better if I just show you," Alek said as the movement of the floor beneath them finally stopped. He approached the middle of the room and lifted a metal ring from the inlay in which it rested.

"A little help?" He motioned towards a second ring and glanced towards Draz who immediately sprang to action.

It took a few minutes, but between the two of them they managed to lift what appeared to be a heavy wooden lid from the floor. As they set the lid down, Alek pulled the chain for a second time.

A heavy mechanical clang sounded from deep within the hole and Claire hoped that Alek wasn't about to tell her they were going to have to go into that thing.

He didn't. Instead, Alek said nothing at all.

He stepped back and watched, a look of childlike glee forming on his face.

As they waited, more mechanical sounds emitted from the darkness.

It took several minutes before they finally caught a glimpse of their intended salvation.

Another strong wind tore through the exposed space, Claire felt much like she had the moment Alek had told her they were jumping off the train.

She wasn't ready to die.