I walked over to the desk near the window, grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen, then crouched down again and copied the bootprints onto it as carefully as I could. The two sets looked different enough that I figured they might matter later, especially if the guards were planning to compare them against anyone who had access to the dormitory.

When I stood up and carried the paper back, Sora had leaned her forehead against the window frame and closed her eyes, breathing slowly through her mouth as if she were trying not to lose her lunch.

"There," I said, holding the page out to her. "There were two people in the room. I drew their bootprints."

She took the paper from me and looked down at it with tired eyes.

"And what exactly do you expect me to do with this?" she asked. "Search the entire city for every man wearing boots?"

I shrugged. "If that is what it comes to, then sure."

"Gods..." she muttered.

I turned back toward the body one more time and forced myself to look closely.

Jelda’s face was destroyed. The top of her skull had been cracked open in a way that was far too messy to be precise work. Whoever had done this had struck more than once. That much was obvious. There were too many fractures around the wound, too many broken lines in the bone, too much crushing damage for a single clean blow. Some of the cuts were shallow, some deeper, and the edges of the wound were uneven, which told me the attacker had probably panicked or kept swinging until the head gave way completely.

That was not the work of someone calm. That was anger. Or panic.

Maybe both.

"The killer either rushed it," I said slowly, "or did not know how to finish the job cleanly. Maybe he was angry enough that he just kept swinging without caring how bad it looked."

Sora finally pulled herself away from the window and stared at the body for a brief second before gagging again.

"Honestly," she said weakly, "that is still a terrifying set of options, Ace."

"Yeah," I replied. "I know."

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and took another breath, still looking pale.

"How do you even stay upright in here?" she asked.

I looked at her, then back at the body. "I have had a bad day," I said.

Sora gave me a tired, disgusted look, then actually laughed once under her breath despite herself. "Shut up," she muttered. "Just keep searching."

So I did.

I forced myself to examine Jelda’s body properly, even though every second of it felt wrong. Her half-lidded eyes stared into nothing, fixed and empty, and after a moment I reached up and closed them with my palm. That only made the whole thing feel worse somehow. I rubbed the back of my head and let out a shaky breath.

Shit.

This was bad.

I shifted lower and carefully lifted her skirt enough to confirm what I already feared. There were clear signs that she had been raped. Blood had dried between her legs, and it had mixed with another stain that did not belong there. Whoever had done this had not only killed her, they had humiliated her first, and that made the whole thing feel even uglier.

"She was raped," I said quietly.

Sora’s face went pale all over again.

"Ah, gods... no..." she muttered, shaking her head. "Roots of Myrrakai..."

"And... there’s some mud on her shoes, too."

Why would she wear her outside shoes in her room?

The fact that there had been two men involved instead of one made everything worse. That meant Jelda had been taken somewhere, held down, and hurt by more than one person before they finally brought her back here. The question now was where they had taken her, how long she had been gone, and whether anyone had seen her leave the room before it happened.

I stood up, grabbed the blanket from the lower bunk, and gently covered her body with it. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

Sora looked like she was fighting not to fall apart. She took a long breath, steadied herself, and finally stepped closer to the room again, though it was obvious she was forcing herself through it.

"Now what?" she asked.

"I need to talk to her roommate," I said. "Do we know who she is?"

"No," Sora replied, rubbing a hand over her face. "But I’ll find her, already gave the order for it."

She looked toward the bed once more, then away again almost immediately.

"Let’s get out of here before this gets carved into my nightmares."

"Hmm."

We left the room, and Sora shut the door behind us. For a moment, she stayed there with her back turned, as if she needed a second to convince herself to keep moving. Then she lifted a hand and knocked once against the wood, almost like she was trying to brace herself, before turning back toward me.

"Let’s go outside."

"Okay."

We walked down the corridor and took the stairs to the ground floor. The double doors to the dormitory were still wide open, with guards stationed both inside and outside the entrance. Once we stepped out into the street, the boys from the other dormitory looked over at me with uneasy curiosity, while the girls scattered around this side of the road stared with red eyes and pale faces.

Nobody said much.

The whole street had gone unnaturally quiet, but the fear was still hanging in the air. A few students were crying a little farther ahead, while teachers spoke in low voices among themselves, trying to piece together what had happened. Professor Kroua was also outside now, her arms crossed tightly over her chest as she leaned against the dormitory wall with a grim expression.

After a short while, a guard came with a student beside him.

"She is the roommate," he said.

"Thank you," Sora replied. "You may go."

The guard bowed once and headed back inside.

The student standing in front of us looked like she had already been crying for a long time. Her hair was a light chestnut brown, tied in a messy braid that had come loose in several places, and her eyes were red and swollen from tears. Her cheeks were pale, and her uniform looked wrinkled as if she had thrown it on in a panic after everything happened.

I could tell she was barely holding herself together.

"Hey," I said carefully. "I’m Ace."

"Pix..." she replied weakly.

"Pix," I nodded. "First of all, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for what happened to Jelda."

She covered her face with both hands and let out a shaky breath.

"Gods..." she whispered. "She was so excited to go against you in the tournament, Ace."

I blinked.

"Me?"

"Yes," Pix said, her voice trembling. "She would not stop talking about you. All the time. I think she liked you."

Shit.

Why was she telling me that now?

It hit too hard, and there was no way to push it away. If I had taken this seriously sooner, if I had done more, if I had kept chasing the pervert with everything I had instead of letting the situation spiral out of control, maybe she would still be alive. I hated that kind of thinking, the endless "if only" chain, but it was already sinking its teeth into me.

"I’m sorry," I said quietly, because I honestly did not have anything better to offer.

Pix sniffled and wiped at her face with the back of her hand.

"Thank you for going after him," she said. "Some of the girls were scared of you... but I’m glad someone tried."

"Thank you," I said. "Pix, can I ask you a few questions?"

She nodded slowly. "Anything."

"When was the last time you saw Jelda?"

"Today," she said, then hesitated while trying to remember. "I do not remember the exact hour. The sun was going down, though. I know that much. Wait, no, I remember going to the bathroom. The student there should have the exact time written in the ledger."

"So you were in the room with her, then you went to the showers, and after that?"

"When I came back, she was gone," Pix said. "I thought she might have gone to the dining hall for dinner, so I did not worry right away."

"Did you notice anything strange about her before you left?"

Pix shook her head immediately. "No. Nothing."

"Was she scared? Stressed? Acting different in any way?"

"No," she said, and this time her voice cracked a little. "She looked normal. She acted normal. She was just... Jelda."

"Anyone talked to her today?" I asked. "Anyone besides her friends and the teachers?"

Pix hesitated for a moment before answering, her fingers twisting together nervously.

"Some guards spoke to her earlier," she said quietly. "She also bought a necklace this afternoon. It was supposed to be one of those alarm charms. If someone pressed the center, it would ring."

"A necklace?" I repeated. "I did not see that on her."

Pix gave a helpless shrug. "I... I don’t know. Maybe they took it."

That made sense, and the thought made my stomach turn even more. Whoever had attacked Jelda probably knew exactly what they were doing. If they had seen the necklace, they would have taken it first. That meant they had planned ahead. That meant they had known what they were after.

Damn it.

If she had pressed that necklace in time, she might still be alive.