“Betsy, Sarah, both of you, pull it together. We can discuss these details later,” John said. He watched as they both stopped bickering back and forth and quieted down.

“Excuse me, but what exactly went down here?” John asked the police officer.

“We are in the process of figuring that out now. It is a scary scene, we know. It is unlike anything we have seen before. We can’t divulge anything at this time, but hopefully we will have more concrete answers soon for you and for the community. Everyone is waiting to find out. This is one of the biggest tragedies Westchester has seen in a very long time. More of our men were lost here last night than in the last century.”

“Stop! Don’t say that. Do you think our daughter is…”

“BETSY! Don’t even utter those words. Don’t you have faith?” John retorted. “I can’t believe you would even think that way.”

“I can’t believe you wouldn’t think that way. I mean, just look at this place. It’s a wonder the grass is still living,” Betsy shouted back.

“This is ridiculous,” John said. “If you don’t have faith, then why did we decide to come here in the first place? Your bad attitude isn’t helping us get any closer to Rachel.”

“Ugh,” Betsy sighed. “Turn a blind eye, like you always do. That’s what got us into this situation in the first place.”

“Oh, so now you’re saying this is all MY fault? You know, you’re really something,” John said. “You always have a way of pinning everything on me. Did you ever stop to think that maybe this is YOUR fault? You’re the mother here. You should have been watching her more carefully. You’re the one that’s home all day and you are the one that should know what she’s up to at every moment.”

“John, I can’t even believe you are saying this to me. I am the last person to be called a bad mother. Judge yourself, not me. I had nothing to do with this.”

“Look at this,” Sarah yelled out from about fifteen feet in front of her parents. “Look what I found!”

Then John watched as Sarah held up a necklace and started flicking grass and dirt off of it. She held it up in the air for her parents to see.

“This is hers!” Sarah exclaimed.

He sped up to get a closer look at what Sarah was holding. He couldn’t believe his eyes: it was his daughter’s necklace, with a key hanging off of it.

“Where did you find this?” John asked.

“It was right here, in front of the castle, laying in the lawn. It was shining up at me as I walked past it,” Sarah said.

Betsy held out her hand to take the necklace from Sarah, “She wore this every day,” she sobbed as she held it close to her heart. “This is the only thing that remains of her.”

“Mom, don’t you understand? Maybe she is still here? Maybe there are more clues?” Sarah said in desperation.

“Hurry, let’s get inside!” John said.

“There is nobody in the castle,” the police said. “The entire place has been searched, and there are no survivors inside. Unfortunately, we can’t go inside at this time. I was just given word from the Sheriff not to allow anyone except authorized personnel in the building. We will have to stay outside and search the grounds.”

“She’s got to be here somewhere!” John said and he started screaming her name, “RACHEL, RACHEL, are you here?”

He waited in silence, but there was no answer. The only thing that he heard was the echo of his voice coming back at him.

“RACHEL, it’s your father, please, if you can hear me, let me know you are there!”

Still, no answer. He began to feel hopeless as he continued walking around the back of the castle, which backed up to a large lake. He saw teams of divers, in the water bringing up bodies and other clues from the scene. It was a sight he couldn’t bear to see anymore. He had to get out of there, and he wanted to shield his wife and other daughter from these images, too.

“I think we’ve seen enough here,” John said to the police.

“We aren’t finished yet. Do you still want to see the rest of the grounds?”

“I don’t think this is appropriate. My daughter is here,” John said back.

“Dad, I’m a grown up, I’m fine. We need to keep going. This isn’t a joke,” Sarah said, her eyes wide.

He couldn’t tell what she was thinking but he knew this was the first time he had ever been to an active crime scene before and definitely the first time he had even seen a dead body.

“No, Sarah. We are leaving now!” John said firmly as he turned his family around and started headed towards the car. “This is not a place for us at this time. You should never have come with us in the first place. If I had known what was happening here, I wouldn’t have come either.”

“But Dad, don’t you understand. We have her necklace. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?” Sarah said, as she took the necklace from her mother.

“Yes, it does. It means she was here, but now she isn’t,” he replied.

“Is that all it means to you?” Sarah asked back, as if he were an idiot.

“Um, I mean, yes,” he answered, beginning to feel dumb. “What else does it mean?”

“See this key?” Sarah said, pointing to the key on the necklace. “This is the key to her diary. The diary she writes in every day. This necklace holds the information to everything we may be searching for. We may have all of our answers.”

He looked at his daughter and smiled. He suddenly felt so lucky to have raised such a smart child. “You’re absolutely right,” he replied.

“Thank God!” Betsy said.

“We have to get home to find that Diary,” Sarah said as she put the key into her pocket.

“Let’s go!” John said as he whisked his family back into the car, as he headed back towards the house.

Chapter Six

“Help! Someone help me!” Hunter screamed as he tried to avoid the light that seeped into the small window of his jail cell.

“Quiet in there!” the guard yelled as he came stomping down the long stone corridor, his combat boots echoing loudly with each step.

Hunter dodged each ray of light as it approached his body. He was all out of Hex Lotion and didn’t have any protection against the sun. He had been in the Greslin prison for a few days now, managing to survive off of nothing but bread, water and a few blood capsules that they gave him.

His cell was damp and humid and smelled to him of rotting fish. It was a circular room made of old stone and mortar. It almost felt to him like he was in the top of a castle, perhaps his cell was in a rampart, he wasn’t quite sure. The night he was thrown in this jail was all a blur to him now. It all happened so quickly, and he was injured. He’d been lashed pretty badly and he was bleeding all over his face, covering his eyes, so he couldn’t see where he was going.

He wasn’t exactly sure where he was, but he knew it must have been in the south somewhere, because the humidity was raging for an October day. He’d never seen anything like it up north at his boarding school. At times he could hear voices coming from outside of his cell window. They were the voices of southerners, with accents. He heard the word, “Ya’ll, Recon, Yonder,” words he hadn’t heard in ages since he’d been up north. He liked it down there, he really did. It reminded him of his time down in Mississippi, when he spent his summer’s studying at the National Vampire School. He’d longed for those days, but since his graduation, hadn’t been back as often as he’d liked.

Another ray of light hit his circular cell, leaving him hardly any room to stand without his skin getting singed off. He sucked in his stomach, and put his back against the warm stonewall.

“Ahhhh!” Hunter screamed as a ray of light hit his bare foot and he saw a brief singing before he pulled his foot quickly out of the light and started blowing on it. “That was a close call,” he said under his breath as he wiggled his toes that had survived the brief and sudden bolt of light.

“You in there, if you keep up this hollerin’ we’re going to throw you outside,” the guard said sternly as he stood there with his arms folded against his large chest. “You must abide by the prisoner laws!” He said, firmly. “Law number one,” he yelled loudly. “You may only speak when you are spoken to!” he said as he glared into the cell at Hunter and then slowly turned his body around and walked back down the long hallway, clomping his feet as he went.

Part of Hunter felt scared and nervous, but another part of him felt that he would make it out alive. He felt that he knew too much information for them to kill him, so he figured he’d put up a fight, and they wouldn’t do anything to him. At least not yet.

All of a sudden, he heard a loud creak as the big iron gate opened at the end of the hallway. In walked four security guards in black suits, with the Greslin crest embroidered on their left breast pockets. Hunter watched as they walked down the long hallway with their dark sunglasses on, heading straight towards him. He hoped they weren’t coming for him, but this time, figured they were. There was no escaping this troupe. He looked up as the four men approached his cell. He waited for them to speak, and knew this wasn’t the time to disobey law number one.

“Are you Hunter?” a large guard said, looking his square in the eye.

“Yes, that’s me,” he said, and suddenly a pang of panic hit him. He suddenly realized the power of the Greslins and what could happen if he misstepped.

“You’re coming with us,” the guard said back as he took out a large ring of keys and started fumbling around, trying to find the right key to fit into the large padlock on the outside of his door.

After five minutes of trying out different keys, his door opened with a bang and in marched the four men. They immediately cuffed his hands behind his back and grabbed his arms, squeezing firmly so he didn’t try to run. They put a blindfold over his eyes and the guards dragged him down the long corridor and out through the big iron gate at the end, which slammed shut behind them.