Burton stayed back, while the others had more curiosity to go up to the odd little house. He didn't want to go up into others peoples things and stuff. Though given the reaction of Ruth the reward for her curiosity was enough to keep him where he was, which he figured would be safe distance away from whatever it was that was so bad.

Abigail immediately ducked next to Ruth, her courageous attitude reduced to wide eyes and shaking.

"R-Ruth, is that a-a witch?!" Abigail whispered as evenly as she could.

Ruth wrapped her arms around Abagail while shaking. "I don't...I don't know. But I think so." She heard the creature come over towards the window. She tried motioned the boys to take cover.

The witch looked out the window and did not appear to see anything that immediately caught her eye. But she hobbled back to a shelf. Ruth looked in again and saw her pick up lock from a shelf covered in them. The witch then turned a key in the lock and dropped it into a cauldron. Around the perimeter of the grove a 6 foot high chain fence shot up out of the ground trapping the four kids. In between the chains that made up the fence was strange glowing energy.

Ruth hugged Abagail tighter. "Oh... several very bad words went through Ruth's head before she settled on, "Carp."

Abigail was rattling with horrified shakes and they just got worse when the gate came up.

"What are we gonna do?"

"Darn it!" Isaac said upon being trapped in. He looked around at his companions quickly. His eyes then darted around the fence and the house, trying to find something that would help.

"I...I don't know Abagail, just...let me think," replied Ruth, trying not to panic. She noticed the boys out in the open and frantically motioned them over to her and Abagail.

Burton, like Isaac, quickly looked back and forth between the now smaller area they were all confined within. Thinking that this was all too odd; The fence, the house, the general area. Seeing Abagail be extra nervous and waving them over, he listened to the instruction. Going over to her and getting down.

It took Isaac a little to follow after Burton, still being busy examining their surroundings. But before too many seconds he arrived right behind Burton. He looked at Ruth. "Any ideas?" He whispered the question.

Ruth took a deep breath in order to calm down and whispered, "That...thing put up the fence by turning key in a lock and dropping it in a cauldron. Maybe if we get that lock and unlock it, the fence will go down."

"Well, who's going in there?" Abigail asked quietly.

Though still scared, the young girl had finally stopped shaking. She felt safer with more people around her.

"I, I could go." Isaac offered. "This witch is probably responsible for my chains. I wanna get a closer look into what's happening."

"Who's going with you, if anybody?" Abigail asked.

"I should go too," said Ruth. "After all I'm big and kinda strong."

"So you just want to go, in there, hope that you don't get caught?" Burton said after hearing what the others wanted to do without much consideration. "Because all of this out here right now isn't messed up enough. You want to go and possibly make it worse to make everything better."

"Do you have any better ideas?" asked Ruth, trying to sound calm but with panic slipping into her voice. "Because it doesn't look like there's another way out!"

"Um... We... We could... Um... Knock?" Burton slowly forced himself to say with a lot of pauses and a suppressed frown.

[Ah, the old bardic knock spell]

Ruth tried to raise an eyebrow at this, but failed and instead raised both.

Ruth snapped her fingers and pointed at Abigail. "Yeah, that's a great idea," whispered Ruth, "You know, strength in numbers and stuff like that."

Burton got up, walked over to the door, and looked at the others for a moment. Then against all probable rational reasoning knocked on the door without a second thought about it.

[The old bardic knock spell trick]

Ruth looked on in horror as a chain shoot out, wrapped around Burton, and pulled him in.