Betony Rue wasn't fond of giving long explanations. She wished Derek was here so she could break his arm and make him do it. If it would make Mr. Liebowitz reconsider though she was willing to give him the information.
"After I arrived here several months ago and became settled, I began to look into the estring of amber alerts and child disappearances of Marcus Hallano, John Pendergast, Alicia Crandall, Samuel Kincaid, and Alexander Reed," Of those, only two had survived.
"I asked for information on the freehold bulletin board. No one came forward with information, so I continued my investigation. I was unable to find anything useful looking into the vanishment of Marcus Hallano at his school. So I again posted a need for assistance. Kevin Sydney and Al-Adin came to help. We visited the Pendergast child's house but the mother turned us away," Had delayed them and her child had suffered for it.
"We met Derek Noble going to the Crandall's residence and he offered his assistance as well. The family was not home, so Al-Adin obtained entrance but found nothing incriminating. He later spoke with some children on the street. They seemed to know about the disappearances and what was causing them. They told him to check the mirrors. He remember there being a mirror in the Crandall girl's room.
"At that point Mr. Noble was able to get Thomas Koskov to join our efforts. Since we were unlikely to gain entrance to any of the childrens' houses unnoticed we got Ranger Arch to take us into the Hedge. Kevin Sydney never showed up and I have not seen him since," undoubtedly suffering from a curse or dead.
"Using a place called the Hall of Mirrors we entered one of the children's bedrooms. Going through the mirror again we appeared in a Hedge field. From one of the Paths leading away we could smell fear. Along that path was a child's toy, belonging to the Crandall child. A sock monkey, Jasper, missing an eye. It was aware, mobile and capable of speech, though I am unsure whether it had been infected by the Wyrd just recently. It had memories from before the Crandall girl getting taken. We took it with us. We followed the path further into a maze. Within were flowers that gave a soporific smell. Al-Adin succumbed but we pressed forward and he recovered after we were out of the vicinity of the flowers. After a time we came to a clearing. At it's center was an island surrounded by a moat of sludge. On the island large false flowers were planted on mounds as well as violets and an outhouse structure was at its center. We crossed the moat using a raft that was already present. The smell of fear was everywhere, as well as panic. I searched out the the scent and found it came from two mounds."
"We dug them up and found coffins containing two children as well as what could have been the decayed petals of the scented roses. The other mounds.. the children had died in them," She had been too late. Did she care?
"I cared for both survivors as best I could there and then asked some further questions of the sock monkey and sewed back on its eye which the Crandall girl had been holding. It spoke of the street children threatening the Crandall child and scaring her the day before she was taken. He described the Bagman, a tall skeletal man with a gunny sack. The sock monkey had fallen out of the bag while the Crandall child kept ahold of his missing button eye. I recognized the description as the Bagman.
"Since the children required more care, we decided I would watch over them and that we should leave. The outhouse contained mirrors to travel through. We sent the coffins containing the dead children through a mirror to the bus station. We have yet to come to a decision on how to inform the police of their identities. We went ourselves to Funderland."
"Leaving the Hedge we found we had been gone about two days. We took both children here where I've been healing them. The boy was catatonic, so I called Simon Oita to see if he could gain acess to his dreams. Mr. Oita had trouble. He was able to observe a little. He spoke of a voice tellin Samuel Kincaid to give it a name. The boy refused. I could only conclude he was dreaming of his captor. Mr. Oita said he was unable to offer further assistance in helping with the boys condition.
I however, have been able to relieve it using my arts, though he still risks regressing. Currently he is mute."
"The Crandall child was able to give more information. She elaborated on the the street children's threats. They had told her that if she did not invite a Tansy girl to her birthday party bad things would happen to her. They caused her harm, making her injur her knee and hand. The Crandall girl claims that she had already invited the Tansy girl and that when she did so again the Tansy child called her a liar and would not accept. Skin and Bones took her that night."
"Mr. Noble, Mr. Koskov and possibly Al-Adin are going to be looking into both the street children and the Tansy girl. I have expressed concern to them that she might not be human."
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