[jjblue1]

Originally Posted by rogerpepitone

On the other hand, her motive for doing so is weak.

For another, how did she know anything about what kind of relationship Battler and Shannon might have had; she'd never seen them together. (Kyrie must have thought that Battler wasn't making any other contact with Shannon and that he had no plans of doing so, other than that letter; otherwise, stealing that one letter would be pointless. He'd deliberately turned down the opportunity to go to Rokkenjima (see Shannon) that year. Breaking up a relationship that had been cold for three years, that had no direct likelihood of restarting on its own, and that she had no good reason to believe had existed in the first place, doesn't seem terribly difficult.)

Battler and Kyrie knew prior to his mother's dead and he considered her a cool person. It's entirely possible he told her/let her understand that on Rokkenjima there was a girl he felt an affinity with prior to Asumu's death.
On Rokkenjima there were many maids but it's implied they're usually older than what Yasu was so it's not really difficult to guess Yasu might be that girl. Just to be sure Kyrie could ask her from how long she was working for the Ushiromiya.
Although no one seems to notice it, Shannon always gets interested when Battler is mentioned and also tries to get info about him, which is something Kyrie might have noticed.

We don't know if Battler placed all the letters in the big envelope or if this was something she did to carry them more confortably so she could have seen to whom they were addressed and, if Battler wrote to Shannon, she would be the only one that's not a cousin to whom Battler would have written. Kyrie specifically said she suggested him to write to his cousins (funny enough there was also a letter for Ange who's not a cousin and that Battler could meet out of Rokkenjima). It could be hard to miss it, even if Kyrie wasn't informed beforehand.

Sure, Battler might have waved it out saying 'she's just a friend' but Kyrie might not have bought it and anyway... (even George realized Battler had been interested in Shannon when he was a kid) just to be sure she could always open the letter and check the content. Then, if it was nothing suspicious, she can put it in another envelope, claiming the original envelope got damaged, maybe by little Ange, and hand it to Shannon.

Now we know Kyrie still holds a grudge against Asumu and that, by default, she transferred it on Battler as well. Why not to ruin Battler's love story as payback to Asumu?

If the whole thing about the missing letter were to be discovered Kyrie could always claim she didn't remember about that letter so she either lost it before placing it in the envelope or that she neither received it from Battler so he's the one who lost it somewhere.

As Battler doesn't seem the type to suspect she might hold a grudge against his mother and him why should he doubt her?

This could have also an interesting chain reaction. If Battler believed he sent a letter to Shannon and never received an answer, from his point of view he would be the one who'd been 'rejected' and so he would assume Shannon didn't take seriously his words and do his best to forget the whole promise and everything connected to it.

Theorically this might have been represented by EP 6, where Battler is cold with Beato, whom he wanted to see again quite a lot because she 'forgot' and he's trying to make her remember again with a mystery game he's apparently playing with someone else.

Of course it's all speculation. We never had Battler's side about what happened in those three years. All we know is that he really had feelings for Shannon but believed he said something stupid when he promised her to take her away on a white horse and that actually he wasn't all that happy it was George who got her... though he usually is supportive of the two.

He labelled his memory of the white horse thing as 'bittersweet' not just as embarassing, and if my poor English doesn't fail me, this implies that was some sadness laced to that memory.

Note also that Battler doesn't have a girlfriend despite being really popular but that after seeing Shannon is with George he considers searching one for himself, that he seems to be the faithful type (he depised his father for cheating, he praised over Natsuhi's love purity), that he notices pretty fast that there's something going between Shannon and George, a sign he was actually paying her attention and that as he realized those two are a couple he claims he only wasted those 6 years he spent away from Rokkenjima. He also regret not returning there sooner.

He also said something interesting:

Women are creatures who always ask questions, and yet, they almost never answer them. What cruel creatures, seriously.

that makes me wonder... when did he question a woman and she refused to answer?

But all this really isn't enough to assume that there was a letter to begin with so it can't help us to figure out where it ended.

Originally Posted by qno2

Though the thought that Yasu herself is a red herring (out of her own volition) for Kyrie is interesting, it at least avoids the problem that Rosatrice has with, you know, the question as to why Chiru even exists in the first place if it's just a huge troll, which wouldn't just discredit the story but Ryukishi as a writer.

I've hard time thinking Shannon tried to cover up for Kyrie.

First because it would change her motive for writing the tales which should have been trying to have HER mystery solved by someone and HER heart reached or make it not the sole motive.

Second, it failed spectacularily as the rumors about the Rokkenjima incident not being an incident and the interest of the witch hunters for it were caused by her messages in the bottles. Before it seems people was more prone to accept the police's theory it was an incident. In short she raised more suspicions instead than decreasing them.

Originally Posted by qno2

Sadly there is the Chapel-Twilight. Unless there is some weird hint that Kyrie dressed up as, say, Rosa (thus the real Rosa would do her best at cosplaying Kyrie at the "halloween party") that one seems quite impossible. But it would still play the same old game of "unconfirmed identities" from the cousin's room in EP6, the identites of the "six" are never stated, just that they're dead.
Additionally, even if there are hints for Kyrie's cosplay as the best mum ever (though she's a good contender for that title anyway), it'd be still ridiculous/very unlikely since all the following red from EP2 talks about Rosa.

The interesting part is that the episodes in which Kyrie is suspicious are the ones written by Battler/Toya and not the previous two who were supposedly written by Yasu. So, if Yasu wrote her episodes trying to get the focus on her, Toya might have copied her scheme to write her own but added to them his memories, unconsciously writing in them a suspicious Kyrie.