"She's obviously hiding something." The statement had been repeated constantly throughout the past hour - Miranda knew it for a fact. Miranda was invisible - not literally - here, though she felt a cool flush on her cheeks when Thomas Lair's eyes lingered on her in the jumbled throng of children surrounding the spaces between them, before his trio passed by her and she recalled that she had a job to do. She often feared, a job her life might depend on now that she'd let fear pluck her from her prison cell, and the brief safety that had rested in silver-blue eyes. "Will Vandom is all we've got."

"What? No. You're wasting your time."

"We have a lot." A set of dark brows raised above a dark set of eyes, and the round face of the man twisted into the slightest frown; movement had ceased as Miranda dug her cold fingers a little deeper into her coat's oversized pockets. She'd never chosen for herself before, if only because Phobos gave her everything rather than making her choose, and she would lie if to say that she'd thrived in the mist of several people asking her if she needed help, and hundreds more bypassing and ignoring her as they pushed past. She willed herself to shuffle forward on wet grass she'd never seen greener of, in the thick, black coat that went warmly to her knees - but Nerissa's gifts would never be as free as Phobos had. And she found that her thin, pale legs would not oblige her. She was meant to fit in here, but she was a rarety even in her own home, so how was she meant to fit in anywhere like this place. "She's everywhere that any evidence takes us."

"I vouch for her myself. Will Vandom isn't anything to do with this, and I assure you that she's-" He was a fool; a foolish kindness, because Miranda knew that Nerissa's word would be law by the squedule that Nerissa would see suited. She wanted this more than Phobos had wanted anything, and she knew how he'd lusted for togetherness. Whatever that might be - Prince Phobos had never known whether to look for love, or power, or his soul. But not every person, got their happy ending. Some one or two would be stabbed in the back by a snake. Thomas Lair had got caught in his own words.

"We have reason to suspect her presence in City Hall, in the district dealing with such things as names, addresses, and birth certificates." Miranda herself didn't much like listening, to the slightest egotism betraying a McTiennan's voice. So she could at least to an extent relate to agent Lair, though he would never know the dramatic irony of it all. "In Elyon's home, I find something in that the girl's tissue was in the bed, nevermind that this was after the fact.. There is more, and I do think we all know from this that she's not exactly known for her charm.."

Miranda's face drained, at the sight of a thick volume that held the school records of a pupil; it was hard to be hard, and she wish she could hate the girl as she had once hated Phobos. "That is not the girl who was present during the initial investigation of the Brown family."

"Time feeds guilt, Lair." Thomas Lair caught the file as it was forcefully pushed against his chest. "Guilt is something of regret, and it's all fed by the evidence which presents itself."

"S-sir." That caught their attention. "I- I have information.. S-she made me p-promise not to tell you.."

Why had Cedric made her such a good actress?

"It's abou- Elyon Brown. Sir. I n-eed to tell you."

Maybe her voice really was stuttered out of fear produced by intimidation.

...

"Will! Open the door!" The little murmur-boy grinned sadly at his own words as he told a story, but the water Guardian's father had a firm frown traced in lines over his forehead as he banged on the door with agents behind him. Luba merely felt her own body being engulfed in the cool sensation, of four elements burning brightly and the fifth being dimmed by her own body. There was no sign, in the Oracle's information, that Wilhelmina Vandom would be ill, but the observer of the Aurameres felt her own body weakening with the weight of the Universe on one child. "Please."

She'd opened the door at that, and Luba scowled as the green eyes stared away from his supposed friend, recounting that in his version he'd merely then opened the door himself. And that she'd been standing, staring. The true Will averted her eyes as she let in three officers of law - she'd said something to herself under her breath that the murmurer's words prevented Luba from hearing. "Mr Lair."

"Some new information, has been revealed." There was something odd in the boy that needed to be doused like a flame; his words were not only Will's, but surrounded her. And he kept staying in sync, though in his remembered dream, he was talking. A woman was talking to Will now. "About Elyon Brown."

From there the scenes took different turns - the young 'child' upsetting himself, or acting so, as he seemed to force out words of catching her when she'd stepped forward, enjoying her anguish when he'd slammed her against the wall; having had thrown her behind him before turning and joining to crush her further with more teeth than lips that were starting to disgust her. Will's fingers quivered, as they clenched blue against the handle of a kettle - offering them tea, before murmuring something of having no ability to throw the water over them. But her hands were shaking. Luba's eyes were fully averted from the aurameres now. Her hands were shaking, as if betraying the eyes that didn't want to. "I don't appreciate being disturbed. I was going to take a bath."

"We wont take long." Therusset eyes were cold when they flashed up at that, and she lifted the kettle a fraction of an inch before almost seeming to force her fingers to drop it. And she turned around to face the Thomas Lair who'd flusteredly said it.

"Then you'll manage to squeeze it in tomorrow. Or do you have something to force me into this conversation when I've done nothing wrong."

"You shouldn't mind proving that."

...

"Is there a need for me to prove it?" Nerissa clapped out a lazy reply to the silence following three police agents' exits, and smirked a little as Will jumped almost unnoticeably; Nerissa invisible, but Will wouldn't know how close the woman had actually ventured, for Nerissa had never bothered actually being in the room before.

"Bravo! Bravo!" There was something in Will whirling around, but Nerissa knew that the girl was only looking for a knife waiting to fly at her, or some other sign that she had fallen asleep on her couch, waiting for the bathtub to fill. Or perhaps, currently, she was in the bathtub drowning - the thought however slid in and out of Will's mind quickly, because surely she'd be made to endure the fate. It was a good idea actually. Drowning the waif in her sleep. But she simply waited for the girl to rest her lower back against the kitchen counted, before Nerissa coyly smirked and let her breath be felt on the child's cheek and ear. "Quite the crime, to be cocky about."

"I didn't throw it at them." No. Nerissa's own fingers slid over; interfering with the curling steam above the kettle. You didn't. And Nerissa smirked as the girl withheld and noise, and simply tensed at the kettle toppling and the fiery hot water draining past that tiny back.

"Oh, but you're involved in the kidnap of Elyon Brown and her family. Didn't you know that it's incriminating for your fingerprints to be on the fake files of her birth, that appeared to have been left when the real ones were surely stolen..? And you slept in her bed.. Sweety, that's not a good idea.." It had become far more enriching to move and speak, as Nerissa's body and voice had grown younger, though she tried to ignore the wrinkles that still crawled over her still dryish skin. The fact that glamouring could only be as convincing as the power behind the spell, though currently she was nothing - it helped to have the air itself, unconsciously steadying and helping her every step. "Didn't you know they were going to catch you out?"

Somewhere, during the point that this had got easier than ever, had the joy been lost in watching tears trickling down the girls face. But Nerissa refused to leave until Will Vandom was crying. Standing, and letting the boiling water wash it's way down her back.