Fortunately, the two of them quickly found the pickpocket who had stolen Aisha’s bracelet. The boy had already sold it, but he tried to run away when he saw Daniel and Ian approaching. However, the two men were not so easily shaken off. They caught him in no time, pressed a blade against his throat and he revealed everything he knew without putting up any resistance.

“I-I only did as I was told! I just snatched the lady’s bracelet to draw her attention, that’s all!”

Ian and Daniel learned from the boy that Aisha had been abducted by professional kidnappers. They immediately gave chase. Within a day, they had tracked her to a back alley and an abandoned warehouse, which they believed to be her location.

However, when they finally arrived, the place was empty. Overcome with frustration and mounting fear, Daniel kicked the wall. Ian clenched his fists too, biting his lip until it bled.

“D*mn it. This is all your fault!”

Daniel, who had been kicking the wooden wall so hard it nearly splintered, suddenly lunged at Ian. He grabbed him by the collar, slammed him to the ground, and straddled him, fist raised.

“Aisha’s heading north because of you! If it weren’t for you, she never would’ve gone out while preparing for that trip to the north…! You bastard!”

Thud!

Daniel’s fist came crashing down, splitting Ian’s lip. He raised his hand again, but then let it fall limply. He knew that hitting Ian was just a pointless way to vent his anger.

He got to his feet. Ian followed him without a word. There was no anger in him, only resignation. In truth, Ian agreed with Daniel’s accusation. He was right. If not for him, she would never have gone north. None of this would have happened.

‘Aisha… in the end, I’ll only ever…’

Ian forced his trembling hand away from his own throat and lowered his head. Just then, something caught his eye between the cracks of the wall and the floor—a sticky red smear and a faint glimmer. He reached for it.

‘…It hasn’t been long.’

As he suspected, the red smear was blood. It hadn’t yet fully dried, proof it hadn’t been spilled long ago. Ian began to search the cracks thoroughly. Though faint at first glance, tiny flecks of dried blood clung here and there to the wooden boards.

‘There’s blood spattered all around… this isn’t just a little.’

Shaking off the shiver that had crept up his spine, Ian examined the object he had picked up. It was a small pearl, stained with blood. Pearls weren’t particularly valuable, and this one certainly didn’t belong in such a dilapidated warehouse.

He rolled it between his fingers. It wasn’t the type used for rings or necklaces. The size and quality of the hole showed that it was the kind used to decorate dresses or shoes.

Daniel, who had been frozen by the sight of the blood, noticed the pearl in Ian’s hand. His eyes widened with realisation. Aisha had been here — of that, there was no doubt. He spun around, shouting:

“Those d*mn pickpockets and their filthy kidnappers!”

Daniel believed that the kidnappers had hurt Aisha and taken her somewhere else. Without hesitating, he ran for the door. However, Ian thought differently. His gaze lingered on the blood. There was far too much blood and it had sprayed far too widely to have come from just one person. The stains had also been wiped away far too deliberately.

‘No… it can’t be…’

A chilling suspicion crossed his mind, and with it surfaced an intelligence report he had recently received. Ian clenched the pearl in his fist, his face hardening. Then he rushed after Daniel out of the warehouse.

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“W-what should I do? Why aren’t they here yet… ahh!”

Sarah bit her nails down to the quick, trembling with fear as dread gnawed at her. Only now did the weight of what she had done sink in, and terror threatened to choke her.

‘Just snatch the girl and bring her to me.’

At first, she had been brimming with confidence. Although spending nearly all her savings to have Aisha Parden kidnapped had been painful, she had found the thought of killing the woman who had ruined her life worthwhile.

But everything went awry. The men she had hired had failed to deliver Aisha Parden to the agreed location. With a sharpened dagger and a vial of poison in her hands and her heavy purse close by, Sarah grew more frantic with each passing hour. By the time half a day had passed since the agreed time, she fled home in a panic.

“If it failed… and if those lowborn scum said anything about me…”

If her misdeeds were revealed now that her father had been arrested and the family was on the brink of ruin, the outcome would be obvious: her half-brother and the Countess would never forgive her. They would hand her over to the soldiers immediately and remove her name from the family register. At the thought of such an end, Sarah clamped her hands over her ears and curled up into a ball.

“No, no… they don’t even know who I am. How could they find me? And if they accuse me, I’ll just deny it.”

She shook her head desperately — a grotesque sight bordering on madness. Nevertheless, no one from House Hotlin came looking for her. So Sarah shut herself away in her room, consumed by unease.

“It wasn’t me. I didn’t…”

How much time had passed like that? After nearly two sleepless days, she finally fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. But just ten minutes after closing her eyes, the commotion outside grew louder, and someone opened her door without permission.

Bang!

“W-what?!”

Sarah jerked her head up in alarm. The intruder paid her reaction no mind, striding over and yanking her roughly to her feet.

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Her muddled senses snapped fully awake at the overwhelming fear she felt. Aisha trembled as she scanned her surroundings.

Unlike the warehouse, where her hands and feet had been tied up, this place was almost comfortable. There was a neatly made bed with clean sheets. The wooden floorboards were worn but polished, as though they were regularly scrubbed. It was nothing like the dusty, suffocating warehouse.

Yet the improved setting did nothing to ease her terror; if anything, it only grew worse. Before she was brought here, she had seen the men surrounding her being slaughtered instantly and collapsing in pools of blood.

“Ah… ahh…”

For a noblewoman raised in a sheltered world, witnessing such a sudden and brutal death was devastating. Her mind had gone blank. Dragged here in a state of shock, she now sat huddled on the bed, retching until her throat burned.

When the dry heaves finally subsided, she bit her lip, forcing herself to think clearly. However, the bloodstains on her dress and the coppery stench in her nostrils made her feel dizzy again.

‘I can’t fall apart. I need to figure out where I am…’

Aisha covered her nose with her hand and averted her gaze from her soiled dress. Shaking, she pushed herself upright and looked around the room.

It was clear that the men who had killed her captors had also kidnapped her. Unlike the first group, however, they had not tied her hands or feet. They had blindfolded her on the way there, but had removed the blindfold once they had pushed her inside. Nevertheless, the freedom of her limbs did nothing to comfort her; the pressure was greater than before.

‘…It’s too high.’

The room felt like a prison cell. The only window was a tiny barred opening near the ceiling that was far too small to escape through. Though plain, the door looked unnervingly solid for such a shabby room.

Clinging to a sliver of hope, Aisha staggered over to the door and repeatedly rattled the cold handle. But it wouldn’t budge — it was locked from the outside. Finally, exhausted, she slumped back onto the bed.

‘If they’ve locked me up, then at least they don’t mean to kill me right away. But why me…?’

Just as Aisha was trying to guess what her new captors wanted, she heard the sound of a lock being picked outside. After several attempts, the stubborn door handle that had resisted her earlier efforts finally began to turn. Frozen to the spot, Aisha fixed all her attention on the door. With a metallic click, the thick wooden panel creaked open a little, and a hand slipped through.

Her breath caught. After the hand came a gaunt, pallid face. A thin man slid in like a snake through the narrow gap, closing the door behind him with practised ease — so smoothly that it was clear he was cutting off any chance of escape before it could be attempted.

He looked directly at Aisha, yet said nothing. His dull, shadowed eyes swept over her, scanning her from head to toe.

As he drew closer, Aisha instinctively stepped back. She had seen that face before. He was one of the men who had slaughtered her kidnappers in the warehouse, cutting them down in an instant. She remembered his expression at the time: blank, despite the blood soaking his body.

“D-don’t come any closer.”

Shaking her head furiously, Aisha tried to retreat, but the cramped room left her no escape. The bed was so narrow that even one adult could barely lie across it, and soon her back struck the wall.

The man, watching her panic, let out a weary sigh as if annoyed. He stepped forward, set one knee on the bed, leaned over her, and thr*st something out.

“Drink.”

He held a wooden cup in his claw-like hand. Aisha’s gaze dropped to it; she was unable to even blink. Inside, a murky purple liquid sloshed ominously. The strange, pungent scent pricked her nostrils, making her turn her head away instinctively.

The man let out a sharp, irritated breath and reached out with his other hand.

“Aah!”

He grabbed her by the hair. Terrified, Aisha shrieked and struggled, but his grip only tightened. His expression remained cold and empty as he pressed the cup to her lips and muttered, “Drink.”

“I don’t want to use force. So drink quietly.”