It took her a bag filled with bread and little coaxing to let the smitten younger kids to tell her what exactly happened that lead them to 'kidnap' her just now.
"So, you mean to say that Hyacinth went missing last night?"
All the kids were nodding their heads vigorously.
"Do you know where she was going or whom she interacting with lately?"
"No we don't. All we know were that you were the last outsiders that she met yesterday" Charlie responded.
"Hmm…if you didn't hear she screamed for help or something, that means she left by her own accord" Charlotte pointed out.
"Why would she do that?! She didn't have anyone beside all of us! She promised us that she would not wonder aimlessly on the street! Especially during night1 it is dangerous!"
"Alright. Calm down now. Do not get too upset. I just hypothesizing one of the possible explanation" Charlotte tried to simmered off the agitated thirteen years old boy.
Despite appeared to be a rude and arrogant, Charlotte knew that Charlie was only being protective toward his friends as the boy felt responsible toward all of them. Throughout their interaction, she could see that the boy prided himself as the leader of the bunch. Hence, Hyacinth going missing must seemed to be a blow to him.
His inability to prevent one of his friend from going missing may have been putting unnecessary pressure on the poor young boy.
"She left us….." Rose who had been sitting on Charlotte's lap muttered quietly. She drawn more and more into her embrace.
"What do you said just now Rose?" All eyes turned to the five year old little girl who was curling up like a kitten in Charlotte's lap.
"Hyacinth left us….I saw it last night" the little girl began to suck on her tiny thumb.
"Rose what did you see last night. Tell us please!" Charlie was pleading to the five year old.
"Last night I woke to a weird sound. She did too. Hyacinth woke up and left all of us. I tried to chase after her from going but she didn't react to me….."
"Weird sound? What kind of sound?"
"I don't know….it sounds like a whistle. But it was scawy…" the little girl continued to suck on her thumb.
"Why didn't you tell me earlier Rose" Charlie sighed after listening to her story.
"It was scawy…..she was scawy…Hyacinth had never ignored me before, but last night she didn't even speak to me. Her face looks scawy…"
' She didn't react to Rose? Did someone caste a spell on her?'
Charlotte suddenly remember about the blank look on the people on the street when My. Kelly chanted Forgotten spell on them.
"It was the mad Pipe Piper!!"
Out of sudden, one of the older boys screamed his lung off.
"Who?"
"Mad Pipe Piper! It was a legend told to me by my late mother. It was a legend from Hamelin of Germany!"
"Hame…hame of what?" Bill scratched his head.
Ignoring Bill's stuttered, the boy resumed to tell them the story that he heard from his late mother.
"It was a legend of a mysterious pipe piper who played a pipe in order to help people in Hamelin town to get rid of their rats problems. But the townspeople refused to pay him as they had promised. The piper then began to play the pipe once again and lured all the children out of the hometown and never to be seen again"
"Are not going to be able to see Hyacinth again?" another girl innocently asked Charlotte. Another boy had already cried as soon as he heard about the terrifying legend.
Charlotte was tongue tied. She did not know how to comfort the children.
"Nonsense!" Charlie who was quite suddenly bursted out loud. "That legend is nothing but nonsense adults create so that they could scare us! How can a music instrument be able to control our entire body?!"
All of the kids nodded their head in agreement with their leader.
Charlotte on the other was imagining how surprised Charlie and the other kids would be if they knew that things such as magic is in fact existed in this world.
"Alright kids. There's no way we are able to know if we don't investigate. Hence, I decided to spend the night with all of you kids so that I could investigate the case. How about that?"
"You're going to stay with us tonight?" Rose's eyes sparkling brightly as soon as she heard that Charlotte will be spending the night with them.
"Yes. I am"
"Yeay!" the girl was jumping ups and downs on her lap.
All the kids (Except for Charlie) looked relief as the got an adult (well the 16 years old Charlotte was considered as adult to them) to keep them company for the night.
That night, Charlotte was determined to caught whomever that was snatching kids away from their cocoon of safety. However, her determination and conscience wither ed when she saw the place where all the kids huddle together to get a good night sleep.
The place where they sleep was basically an old warehouse that was clearly abandoned many years ago. It was filled with other children around their age cramping together in the small space that they shared.
Rose was excited to get to sleep beside Rose. The little girl hugged Charlotte's neck in her sleep.
Seeing the innocent kids living a hard life made her heart sank. Is this how their safe heaven looked like?
*******
"Mademoiselle, it's night already. Your new staff has not been back since this afternoon. You are not going to do anything about it?" Roux who had been watching the street since the evening was skeptic with the mademoiselle's incredible tranquility.
A crow suddenly appeared in the shop and making a loud noise.
"News about your maid! News about your maid!"
"She's not my maid. She's my new worker" the mademoiselle corrected the crow. She took the small paper that was tied to the crow's legs and open her shop's door to let the bird flew out of the place.
"I still wonder why the bird can appear out of nowhere but could not disappear and we have to let them out. It was inconvenient!" Roux snorted. It was the mannequin's habit to emulate human's body language.
"That's because the crow was protected under the sage's Protection Spell when they have information on their body. Once the information is taken by the receiver, the spell would loose it's charm and the bird is no longer have magic to protect them. It was the truce make by the Sorcerers and the Watchers a long time ago" The mademoiselle calmly explained.
Even though Roux was technically 'involved' with the Underworld Associate longer than her, but there was a lot of things that she did not know as the mannequin spent most of her time in the shop. The mannequin only listened to the shop's mademoiselle. A little trivia on how Underworld Associate works means nothing to her.
"What was the news say?"
"Nothing much. It says here that Charlotte was abducted by the street orphans because they though she was the one who kidnap their missing friend"
"That is a weird turn of event. Almost ironic I must say"
"But now Charlotte volunteer to accompany the orphans for the night in order to capture the real kidnapper. I don't know whether this girl is intrepid or just plain idiot" the mademoiselle crumpled the small paper and threw it into the fire place.
"I opted for the later" the mannequin once snorted.
"Well she choose that. And we, have our own urgent matter that we had to sort out tonight" the mademoiselle was staring intently at the shop's door.
"It seemed that both of us have to forgo our comfortable bed for tonight"
"Like I sleep on a bed every night" Roux rolled her fake eyeball.
*******
"I hope you would leave right away by tomorrow and never return" the snide remark coming from Charlie, startled Charlotte. The boy suddenly appeared in front of the young woman who was laying on the thin mattress that she shared with little Rose.
"Hey…that's not a nice thing to say to someone older than you" Charlotte whispered silently as she was afraid that they would disturb the other sleeping kids.
"Don't try to show how good adult can be. They are all selfish prick!"
"You would be an adult in matter of few years" she pointed out.
"I'll be a good one"
"What's the difference? Ahhhh…..I'm having a headache just by conversing with a stubborn boy like you" Charlotte pretended to massage her forehead.
"I don't like seeing adult like you showing concern toward innocent kids like Rose. You should not coddle her like what you are doing right now"
"Why? Are you by any chance feel jealous?"
"No!" the boy horridly denied the accusation. "I don't want Rose to get attache to someone who would only stay for a night. She would be crying for you tomorrow and I was the one who had to cajole her to sleep. It's exhausting" the boy muttered silently.
"Ouhhh…" Charlotte was at lost of words. While she enjoyed playing around with the overprotective Charlie by pampering little Rose, she forgot how significant her little jester for the little girl.
She began to regret her decision clinging too close with the little girl. She should have put a distance between them in order to make it easier for Rose when she due to leave by tomorrow.
Now she understand why Charlie was so rude and wary toward her.
The boy was the closest thing that all the kids have to a brother figure. And he was not even a young man himself. He was just a boy pretending to be a teenager. She should be more sensitive on how to conduct herself with the children as she was not going to be a permanent figure in her life.
"I'm sorry Charlie"
The boy did not responded. He choose to stay silent as the older girl had received the message that he was trying to deliver to her.
'It's going to be a long night' She thought. The night began to seem dull as she no longer feel fun picking on Charlie.