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I blink and feel the useless tears fall down my cheeks. They won’t bring her back. They won’t erase the accusation in her sightless eyes. It’s my fault, just like before.

“Breathe,” he commands.

I try to take a breath, but my lungs fight back.

“Another.”

I take another breath, and this one is as difficult as the first.

“Another.”

This one is a little easier.

The headmaster waves his hand, and I feel a portal open behind me. “Go inside.”

I blink and look over my shoulder at the portal, seeing my dorm room door. The headmaster gently turns me around and pushes me through the opening. It snaps closed the second my feet hit the carpet of the hallway. I just stand there. My breathing has evened out, but my body is still stuck in a state of shock. I can’t move. My limbs feel like lead, and my joints have seized up.

Alice opens the door, her face etched in confusion. “What are you doing?” she asks.

I glance at her, feeling myself start to crumble.

Alice inhales deeply. Her nose wrinkles, but her expression softens with concern. “Sum?”

Emotions climb up my throat, and it feels like I’m choking on them. Another salty tear slides down my cheek, but I just stare at her.

Alice approaches me carefully as if she is afraid I will bolt. She gently turns me around, looking me over. “This blood isn’t yours,” she says with certainty, having already scented it.

“I found…” My voice is hoarse and broken. It sounds like I’ve been screaming for days, but I haven’t. I let out one scream, one show of pure terror.

Alice shakes her head, her hands still roaming over me, looking for invisible injuries. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say it.”

The sob that had lodged itself in my throat finally rips itself free, and another tear falls. “She—” Another sob escapes me. “I think she was wearing my sweater.”

Alice looks around suspiciously and wraps her arm around me, pulling me into the dorm. She paces, glancing at me every few seconds as if assuring herself I’m still safe.

“Which sweater?”

I swallow, looking at the ground. “The pink one with the daisy buttons.”

“Shit. You were looking for that just last week.” She stops pacing for a moment, and I feel her gaze on me. “Maybe it was just a similar one?”

I shake my head. “It had the scorch mark on the cuff. The one I got when?—”

“When Zane was fucking about with runes,” Alice finishes for me.

I nod, another tear falling.

Alice’s jaw clenches, and her eyes flash crimson. “Get your stuff. We’re going tonight.”

Happy to comply with orders right now, I walk to my room on autopilot and start packing. Alice doesn’t let me out of her sight the whole time. She even follows me to the bathroom when I wash the blood from my hands, and as I’m shoving clothes into my bag, I notice another couple of my items missing. It is nothing big, but I had a black t-shirt withRuin my Runeson it. The neckline had been cut so that it sat off the shoulder. I also couldn’t find one of my skirts and a pair of yoga pants that had a small hole in the inner seam, not to mention the multitude of panties that have disappeared.

“Ready?” Alice asks for the fortieth time since I walked into my room. I can feel her anxiety, and she must be scared if she thinks Drãculea is the safer option.

I nod, and Alice places her hand over her heart. Black claws shoot from her fingertips, piercing her skin. She rotates her hand, and a portal opens beside her in an explosion of bright red light. Alice drops her hand, her blood dripping onto the floor. That is going to be a bitch to clean up. She looks through the portal at the gloomy gray skies and dark, oppressive buildings.

We step through the portal. “Welcome to Drãculea,” Alice says.

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