Over the next few days, things were quiet. The new people grew used to their positions quickly, and everyone returned to their routines like nothing had happened that night when the young serving girl disappeared. There was no concern shown at all when the other worker did not show up for breakfast the morning after. Maybe nothing did happen, Sam told himself. Butler said that sometimes people just couldn't handle it and left. Everything he thought he heard and saw could have been his imagination. At least, that is what he told himself. The nights were long after he woke up from his nightmares, unable to get back to sleep. If he didn't figure out a way to stop jumping at every odd noise, he was going to be so exhausted that he would hurt himself. He didn't want to fall down the stairs because he fell asleep while walking down them.

Chiro did not seem to be doing much better. The dark eyed youth had dark circles to match under his orbs, and his words seemed to come out even faster than usual when he was tired.

"I peeked in the entranceway when butler was bringing in deliveries, I am gonna try and get his door code next time -"

"Door code?" Sam interrupted, ruffling his dull blonde hair as he relieved an itch at the top of his head.

"Like a ready troglodyte," Chiro sputtered. He rubbed his face with his slender hand and tried to calm down. "The doors don't use your...keys? Right? The main door is controlled by a special little box that you enter numbers into open. You call the numbers the code."

Sam nodded quickly. He understood things in practice now, even if he didn't get the theory. "But why do we want this code?"

"Do you really think that girl went unbalanced? Two people gone in two days. Something is wrong here, and I want to have an escape plan."

Sam nodded and bowed his head over his bowl of soup. This was not the first time Chiro had talked of escaping. It wasn't even the first time that day. He made an agreement when he accepted the job, and he couldn't pay to break the agreement and leave. Sam knew it was mostly bluster, the talk of escaping, but talking about it gave them both a boost of courage that was needed before going up the narrow servant staircase and to their tiny rooms at night.

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The next day, Chiro was not standing at his door as he usually was. Sam had to go in and wake the boy up. He shoved the tan, woven pants, and button-up shirt into the bony arms and went back to the hall to wait. As he stood there, nodding at the other servants who shuffled past, his eyes happened to land on a long line right above the wainscoting on the wall across from him. Dodging the new male from the laundry room, he stepped closer to get a better look. What looked like a narrow smudge was actually a furrow. It traveled between the two nearest doors, chipping the wood frame of the door across from Chiro's room at its end.

"What do you suppose that is," he asked Chiro when his friend came up beside him.

"I don't know, someone drug a crate along the wall?" A loud yawn demonstrated his lack of interest. "It is just a line. Let's get breakfast."

Sam spared it one last look before turning to leave. It was probably nothing, he told himself. Just a line.

His brain did not accept his affirmation. All day long, that simple little gouge was a tenant in his head. It took two calls for attention while washing dishes before he realized that someone was speaking to him.

"I am sorry. I didn't hear you. Can I help you?"

In the doorway leading out into the manner stood a man Sam had never seen before. Tall, with the clean and smooth skin that came from never laboring under the sun, and a black suit that seemed to absorb the light of the room. Straight hair, so blonde it might have been white, was pulled into a tail at the back of his neck and draped casually over one shoulder.

"Where is cook?" His voice was cold and flowing, like the river near Sam's homestead right before it froze over in the winter.

"I am here, my Lord, I stepped out for just a moment. What can I do for you?" Cook hurried from the servant dining area, nervously wiping his hands on his apron.

"I want to change the dinner menu for the night."

"Of course, my lord. What would you like served tonight?"

Sam watched as the normally steady man seemed to tremble in front of the man that Sam now knew was the lord of the manor.

"Steak. Rare." Watery blue eyes bore into Sam. "I feel as though I could not eat enough of it right now."

"Of course, my lord. It will be prepared just as you requested."

The eyes languidly blinked, and then he was gone. The doorway sat empty once more.

"That was the noble who owns this manor?" Sam asked more to be polite than to verify. With that mien, who else could it be?

Cook sighed and leaned heavily against the counter. "You best stay to your duties, young Sam," he said, his shoulders slumped. "You have enough to occupy you without getting the Lord's attention."