The dorms turned out to be surprisingly close to Margaret’s house. I could see it from the front entrance, a spooky wooden house on a hill. It looked like the cover of a children’s horror novel.

The dorms looked like every other building, except Lily had to swipe a card to get in. According to her, there were a lot of complicated rules around allowing guests in that we were ignoring since they never got enforced. Indeed, when we walked in the student at the front desk didn’t even look at us.

The lobby was fairly busy. I guessed that it was late enough in the day that people were getting out of their last class. Inside, the floor quickly transitioned into carpeting and the walls became white-painted brick.

Lily’s dorm room was on the third floor. I followed her to a door by the side, which led to a stairwell. I hesitated.

“Could you point me to the elevator?” I asked. I was absolutely capable of walking up to the third floor, but that didn’t mean I wanted to. The walk here had been bad enough.

Lily’s eyes widened.

“Oh, right- of course. This way.” She somehow looked more embarrassed about it than I was. I tried not to be upset by that.

I followed her a little further down the hall until we reached a set of double elevators. Lily got there first, of course, so she hit the button. That was another reminder of Felicity. Presumably, an elevator was waiting on this floor because it opened right away.

I took the opportunity on the elevator to catch my breath, obviously leaning against one of the walls. My cough sounded so much worse in this small space. Lily moved her hands about nervously and my irritation grew.

It was the longest elevator ride of my life, both literally and figuratively. The dorm elevator was shockingly slow, which was probably why Lily preferred the stairs. Finally, mercifully, the elevator opened to let us out.

Lily let me get out first, for some reason, so I just went in the direction she pointed. We stopped at suite 306, a door that looked like any other.

“You know,” Lily said suddenly, “they didn’t take my key and I doubt they changed the lock. So we don’t even need to break into it.” She sounded almost disappointed as she pulled a keyring out of her pocket.

“How long would it take to pick the lock?” I asked.

“It depends on a lot. How good your tools are, how good you are, if you’re trying not to be obvious about it, and a bit of dumb luck,” she said. She swung the door open with a bit of apprehension. “Could be anything from a few seconds to several minutes.”

We stepped into the suite and I closed the door behind us. I took a minute to look at the layout. There was a fairly small central area with a couch and window on the far wall. We were high enough that the birds probably weren’t watching through it, but I still felt exposed.

Along the side of the door was a kitchen area, the only uncarpeted part of the room. It amounted to a sink with a few cabinets hanging over it and a small refrigerator. Each of the side walls had a door leading into another room, as well as one on the far end that seemed to lead to a bathroom.

Which task to do first? We could look at Amy’s room, but Lily would probably be in a worse mood afterward. So, the question first then. I could dance around it, but she’d responded well to directness so far.

Lily was looking at the door on the right, she had been since we walked in.

“Why do you know so much about lockpicking?” I asked. It had been a curiosity when she first brought it up, but she spoke about it far too confidently. She was either an expert or quite full of herself. Her awkwardness made expertise the more likely of the two.

“It’s just-” she started to say, before cutting herself off. She turned to look at me with an expression I couldn’t read. “I’d rather not talk about it.”

I paused, weighing options. It was very suspicious that Lily started to lie about it on instinct. The redhead had been surprisingly honest with me, which made the lie stand out all the more. I needed to get an answer. I might be able to if I leveraged my utility to her as a lie detector.

The fact that the doors could be picked fairly easily shifted the balance of probabilities towards a mundane explanation for Amy’s death. Without a reason to suspect a hedge witch, I could just walk away. I didn’t have a sense of justice or anything as ridiculous as that to keep me here.

“Alright,” I found myself saying. “I assume that door is Amy’s room?” I nodded to the door on the right, my mind spinning rapidly.

Lily sighed with obvious relief, tension leaving her body, before returning from the subject matter.

“Yeah. I found her in there Monday.” Lily walked over to the door, seeming to take a moment to ready herself.

I had to work backward to determine why I had made the decision. Was it a sense of fairness? She doesn’t pry into my life and I don’t pry into hers? I hadn’t needed to invoke the terms of the deal yet. Was it- Oh, that was it. I didn’t want to threaten to walk out because I might have to follow through and then this would be over.

Lily opened the door and stepped into Amy’s room.

I was an idiot. I’d made this exact same mistake before, was I seriously going to do it again?

I stepped into the room after her. It wasn’t cramped, but it was tight enough that we’d need to move around each other. Amy’s bed was against the far wall, with all the sheets stripped off it. There was a window over the bed, but this one had blinds closed.

The bed was clearly where Amy had died. While the body itself was gone, the blood spray had not been cleaned up yet. It was extensive, reaching well above my head on the walls. A sheet had been thrown over the floor, which was the only reason we weren’t stepping in it.

I did a quick survey of the rest of the room. Amy’s backpack was by the door, fortunately spared most of the blood spray. She had a desk in the corner, but it was fairly barren. In contrast, there was a small closet practically stuffed with clothing.

“I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to ask you about the body,” I said. Lily shook her head, still staring at the bed.

“It’s fine. It’s not like I can forget it.” Her voice was surprisingly strong given the circumstances, though it still shook. “She was on the bed. Like I said, multiple pieces. Somewhere between ten and twenty, it’s hard to say with how much blood there was.”

“Did it look torn or cut?” She looked confused, so I adjusted the question. “How much of the guts were still inside the body?”

“Not a lot. Lots of… extra flesh there. Like I said, I couldn’t even tell it was her at first.” Probably torn, then.

“Do you know what she wore to sleep? And did you see that clothing on her body?”

Lily focused for a moment, closing her eyes and grimacing at what she imagined. After a second, she shook her head.

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“I don’t know what she wore and I didn’t get a good enough look to tell if there was anything... mixed in there.”

Each answer eliminated magical options, but what was left was a blurry picture. The sheer extent of the damage described implied ritualcraft. You could probably pull it off with a wand, but no hedge witch would have that. I didn’t even have a wand.

I knelt down, looking underneath and around the bed. I even asked Lily to step outside so I could pull up the sheet over the floor. She jumped at the opportunity, her discomfort finally overwhelming her. I couldn’t find any drawings or a spot of missing blood to imply that someone had cleaned off the ritual.

Would this be possible with a spell? I didn’t have a great grasp on combat magic, but this level of damage seemed quite excessive for that. Felicity would certainly know.

Lily watched me from outside the door, clearly curious about what I had been looking for. Since I couldn’t lie, I just kept silent. Amy’s backpack, which the police hadn’t felt worth taking, had two library books. I took them both, transferring them to my backpack. “The Mind of Monsters: Murder Cults” and “Honest Polyamory”. I couldn’t guess what they said about Amy, but someone had to return them.

I took a bit to go through her folders. The only thing of note other than classwork was a flier she’d shoved into her bag for a club. They called themselves a supernatural studies club, but- well they spelled magick with a ‘k’ and that was all I needed to know they knew nothing real.

I looked in her closet too, for the sake of thoroughness. Amy’s clothing looked fairly generic but tucked into the back were a few gothic outfits. I quite liked them, though I couldn’t imagine wearing anything like it myself.

We were missing a phone, but that was probably with the police and therefore out of our reach. I considered asking Margaret if whatever she’d done to the police could get it, but I doubted we’d get anything. Not to mention, I really didn’t want Margaret getting involved in this before I had no choice.

From the light in the window, I could tell I’d spent a lot longer than I thought going through this room. There just wasn’t anything more to find.

“Alright,” I said finally. “I think we have everything we’re going to get.”

I couldn’t help but feel unsatisfied. I essentially had no more information than I’d walked in with. I should’ve expected it really, I wasn’t a detective. My expertise began and ended with magic. Even my supposed interrogation skill was just that.

Lily was giving me an odd look. Her golden eyes felt oddly piercing in this light.

“Did you figure anything out from that?” she asked. She didn’t seem surprised when I shook my head. “Damn. I guess all we have is the long shot then.”

“Nathan?”

“Him too, but I was thinking of the occult club.” She held up the supernatural studies flier, which she’d grabbed at some point. “I remember Amy got back late on Fridays, which means she probably went. It’s definitely her type of crowd. And it’s another group of people for you to read.”

I gave it some thought. On one hand, I really did not want to have to deal with the kind of people who spelled magic wrong. But on the other hand, if I was looking for a hedge witch, a supernatural studies club would be the best place to do it. It’s the group of people most likely to both find real magic and be dumb enough to use it.

Lily spoke up.

“Sorry, I know you only agreed to talk to Nathan. I didn’t- I’ve just been assuming you want to keep doing this. You probably have your own stuff.” She seemed to have misread my uncertainty.

“I’m the one who asked to come here,” I pointed out. Besides, “I’ve actually enjoyed this. It’s… probably not right to enjoy it, you’re trying to help your friend. It’s been a long time since- I don’t really have any friends.”

“You have one now.” She said it so resolutely that I was taken aback. The blush on her face made me think she was just as surprised. “I mean- I shouldn’t-” I decided to save her from her floundering.

“Thank you. Yes, I’ll come with you to the club.” I checked the flyer. The club met at 6 pm, which was well after I’d be done with Margaret. Lily seemed to calm herself considerably. “We should part ways for today though, it’s already getting late.”

“Of course,” she nodded. A flicker of some emotion I couldn’t decipher passed over her. “We should exchange numbers, so we can work out somewhere to meet.”

My third phone number. I tried to act less excited about that than I was. The third person, at least. I also had the local police, fire department, poison control, and a suicide hotline Felicity had put into my contacts when I wasn’t looking.

We left the dorm room, riding the elevator down in relative silence. It was a comfortable silence, a far cry from how we’d gone up. I could see Lily was preparing herself for something, though.

When we stepped outside, we both seemed to realize simultaneously that we were headed in different directions.

Lily looked back into the door, seemingly not liking how many people could still see us. She grabbed my hand, pulling me off to the side of the building, out of view of the front windows.

Her hand was just as warm as last time, very noticeable over the chill in the air. Control your breathing, Claire.

She let go fairly quickly once we were out of sight, but the heat lingered. She turned back towards me with a light blush on her face.

“I just realized that I haven’t thanked you for helping me today,” Lily said. The hand wringing was back with a vengeance. “You didn’t have to do that, I practically ambushed you back at the library and you have your- whatever thing that you can’t talk about. It’s been so nice just talking to someone who isn’t walking on eggshells around me.” She seemed to hesitate, before pressing on. “So, if I were to stop by the library tomorrow, just to talk- not about Amy- well, about Amy if you want but just to hang out, I mean. Would that be ok? I don’t want to bother you.”

It somehow didn’t hit me until that moment, that this girl didn’t just find me useful but genuinely wanted to be my friend. Hell, she was nervous about me not wanting that.

“Yes,” I managed. “That would be fine- good. I’d like that.” There could be issues if she saw what I tended to research there, but I could deal with that. I would find a way to deal with that.

Lily smiled that same wonderful smile, golden eyes sparkling. And then, as if she was trying to kill me, she threw her arms around me in a quick hug.

“See you tomorrow,” the monster said before spinning around and walking away. It never looked back, which was good because I don’t think I could have explained the look of terror on my face.

----------------------------------------

I stood at the front door of the house, fighting down the dread that threatened to overwhelm me. I had already reinforced my persona as far as I could. This was not going to be pleasant.

I put my hand on the doorknob, hesitating again. I’d spent as much time planning out this conversation as I could. Ideally, there wouldn’t be a conversation, but that was a ridiculous fantasy.

I made myself push the door open.

“I have not betrayed you yet.”

And there she was, looking down at me over the railing of the workshop. Her glare threatened to freeze me in place as surely as any curse. I was allowed to close the door before she spoke.

“What did we agree,” Margaret asked, “after that Felicity girl?”

“That my sexuality was a weakness and I would not form relationships that could use it against me.” Meeting her eye would be an act of challenge, but looking away from her was a sign of guilt. Therefore, I looked at her feet. All on script so far.

“So then. Would you please-” A pause. Margaret looked behind herself before continuing. “-explain how that harlot is not you betraying me?”

‘Harlot’ was a bad sign.

“She is connected to what could be a hedge witch within your territory. I was using her to investigate them. The witch left a body mutilated in improbable circumstances with no-”

“And what part of that,” Margaret snapped, “necessitated you whoring yourself out to her?”

...what?

I could feel each moment tick by as I searched for an answer. Saying I hadn’t would just make her angrier. Did I fold now?

A memory resurfaced, Margaret’s fury that she hadn’t been able to kill Felicity without declaring war on the cult. Lily had no such protections.

“The-” I tried to say ‘harlot’ but I couldn’t think of Lily that way, “-girl has the same weakness I do. I intend to take advantage of it.”

Her ‘weakness’ was just a guess, an inference from a couple of things that were maybe just hopeful thinking.

The silence stretched. Each second was agonizing. Five seconds. Ten seconds. Fifteen seconds.

“To think,” she said finally. I successfully repressed the flinch at her finally speaking again. “That our legacy has fallen so far that you must resort to this to find a simple hedge witch.” There was genuine sadness in her voice.

“‘Pride is an errand for fools and-’”

“Don’t talk back to me!” Margaret snapped. But the quote had landed, I could tell. She’d have cursed me if it hadn’t. “Fine. Deal with this hedge witch on your own, I have more important things to do than care about you debasing yourself.”

She evidently did care, but she turned around and retreated into her workshop.

I didn’t let out my breath until I was in my room and the door was closed. Once it was, I collapsed to the floor in a fit of horrible coughs.

----------------------------------------

Two hours later, I got a text from Lily.

Lily: ik what you said abt the library. if you want to talk im here