"Used them quite all, I see!" he remarked blandly. "These others, poor things, thought they could change back the other side of my domain!" And the Wizard laughed most unpleasantly loud--just like his knocker. "Please, sir," ventured Dulcie coaxingly after his hilarity was over--"please, sir, do let us go home." "But your brother--I'm sure he wouldn't be satisfied." "Indeed I would," said Cyril. "Tush! Nonsense!" exclaimed the Wizard. "_I_ never say 'Don't' here--so you are going to live with me and be oh so happy and free! free to do everything I tell you. You would have been more useful as a Crab. But now you shall _both_ tend my little Zoological Collection--they are not always so still, oh no! You shall help me do my tricks. You shall help me ruin that fishy old King; and help me keep that Bird-Fairy in order till she shall rue the day that she ever tried to----" The Twins heard no more. Locked in one another's arms they had suddenly sunk down in placid slumber. The astonished Wizard stopped in his flow of eloquence. He walked round and round them. His face grew blacker and blacker, whilst the Twins slept calmly on, Dulcie's head resting peacefully on Cyril's shoulder. "Well I'm blessed!" muttered the Wizard, "or should be if I weren't so...." [Illustration: _Taking the boy and girl by a hand, he led them_] CHAPTER VIII THE SPELL--AND HOW IT WORKED The poor children felt as though they had come under some gentle influence, and curiously enough, though outwardly asleep, they were conscious of the Wizard walking around them, pushing and pinching them, which somehow they never felt; and they were conscious, too, that he was troubled about something. What it was they couldn't imagine. He began to mutter threats coupled with the name of the Bird-Fairy. The Wizard was clearly not at all happy. Indeed, he was profoundly concerned--for every time he touched the children to wake them, a sensation of cold spread over his hands which became rapidly more and more acute until it felt like touching fire, and he shrank back muttering and grumbling. At that moment there was a great rush of air. The Bird-Fairy appeared, and with outspread wings she stood over the resting children, and, full of pity, she gazed down at them. Then they knew they were in her care, and they knew, too, that _they knew something which might prove useful and precious_. And they smiled happily as they lay there. "What do you want here?" demanded the Wizard harshly. "How dare you come here and try to thwart me?" "I have come to pray you to turn from your evil ways. Let these poor children go," begged the Bird-Fairy in tones sweet and pleading. "They have realised how much their happy home means to them and the safety there is in being taken care of. Let them go back to it." "Tush! Nonsense! What's all that to me? Begone while I let you! I'm in no mood to be trifled with." "Show kindness and mercy for once," was her reply.