The dormitory breathed.
Eighteen bodies under thin blankets. Eighteen breaths of air going in and out at different rhythms. Eighteen lives that Maristela was leaving behind.
She should go. Now. Every second she stayed was a risk.
But her feet wouldn't obey.
She walked between the beds like a sleepwalker, her eyes fixed on the bunk bed in the corner. The top one was empty – it was hers. The bottom one belonged to Silvane.
Silvane, the oldest among those who had already been "used." Silvane, who never resisted. Who never screamed. Who returned to the dormitory with empty eyes and lay down in silence, waiting for the next full moon night.
Maristela had always hated Silvane for that.
'I've always hated you for never resisting. For accepting. For letting him do what he wanted without fighting. For making me feel like I should accept too, when my turn came.'
She stopped beside the bunk bed. Looked at the motionless body under the blanket. Silvane was on her side, facing the wall, her shoulders tense.
Awake.
Always awake on full moon nights. Waiting. Knowing.
Maristela knelt. Brought her mouth close to Silvane's ear. Whispered, almost without sound:
"I can't stay. Getting caught would be worse than dying. Even if he deserved it."
Silvane didn't move. But her breathing changed – a micro-shift, almost imperceptible.
Maristela swallowed hard. The next words burned in her throat, but she forced them out:
"I've always hated you for never resisting. I wished it were you in my place."
The Orphan's voice whispered, surprised – but not shocked. It was a new tone, something between admiration and mockery:
'Beautiful. You hate her for not resisting, but she's the one who stays. She's the one who'll deal with the next priest. She's the one who'll hold the other girls' hands when they cry. You run. She stays. Who's stronger?'
Maristela wanted to answer – 'It's not about strength' – but she had no time. No words. Nothing but Silvane's hand squeezing hers and the bell already starting to toll outside.
She forced herself to continue:
"Use the money. It's in the well. Almost a thousand réis. Take care of the girls. Buy real food. Buy medicine. Get Clara out of here before…"
She didn't finish. She didn't need to.
Silvane still didn't move. Her shoulders were still tense. But then, under the blanket, her hand moved. Slow. Cautious. Searching.
It found Maristela's hand.
Squeezed.
A minimal gesture. Almost nothing. But it meant everything.
Silvane's voice came hoarse, broken, as if she hadn't used her throat to speak in a long time:
"Blessed be. Go with God."
Maristela squeezed her hand back.
Then stood up.
She didn't look back.
The corridor was dark.
The oil lamps in the saints' niches cast dancing shadows on the stone walls. Mary Magdalene with glassy eyes. Saint Sebastian pierced by arrows that seemed to move. Christ on the cross, head tilted, watching.
She crossed the corridor like a ghost. Went down the stone stairs without making a sound. In minutes, she was back at the priest's door.
The heavy, dark wood with the carved cross. Behind it, the body. The blood. The smell that was already starting to leak through the cracks – sweet, metallic, wrong.
She didn't want to go in. Who would?
'You're going.' The voice came cold. Practical.
Maristela took a deep breath. Her hand found the brooch. The tip pierced her skin – the pain came hot, sharp, cutting through the buzzing in her head, the tremor in her legs, the disgust rising in her throat.
Focus.
She pushed the door open.
The room was the same.
The body on the floor. The blood spread out, forming irregular puddles in the cracks between the stones. The tipped-over table, the scattered papers. The fallen lamp, the flame already dead, the smell of burnt oil mixing with the smell of death.
Was Dan face down? On his back? She didn't remember.
The memory of the struggle was a blur. His hand on her arm. The wine breath. The weight pushing against the table. And then – the teeth, the taste, the body falling.
She approached.
Looked.
The struggle marks – her nails on his arm, her nails on his face. Red, deep, evidence.
'Look at the marks.' The voice pointed. 'Your nails left marks on his face. That's proof someone struggled with him. Someone who didn't want to be there.'
"That incriminates me."
'It incriminates a girl who fought. It doesn't have to be you. It could be any girl. But as long as the marks are there, they'll be looking for a girl.'
She understood.
She needed to disguise it. Make it look like he died some other way. Like whoever fought with him wasn't a girl.
'Think.' The voice guided her. 'What does a man do when he's alone in his room?'
"Drinks. Reads. Writes."
'Drinks. Exactly. And if he drank too much, fell, hit his head?'
"There's no mark on his head."
'Then make one.'
Maristela looked at the body. At his head. At the corner of the tipped-over table.
'Push him. Make him look like he fell.'
She hesitated. Her hands paralyzed.
'MARISTELA.'
She obeyed.
The body was heavy, dead, a bag of wet sand with joints that bent where they shouldn't. She grabbed the arm – cold, stiff – and pulled. The torso moved a few inches, then the legs slid through the blood, leaving a dark trail.
She dragged him to the table. Knelt. Put Dan's head near the corner.
'Bang his head. Make a mark. Make it look like he fell.'
She grabbed him by the hair – cold, damp, strands slipping between her fingers. Squeezed harder, felt the skull beneath the skin. Pushed against the table corner. A muffled sound. Flesh against wood. Pushed again, harder. This time, a dry crack – wood against bone.
When she let go, a bruise was blooming on his forehead. The skin was broken in one spot – blood trickled, slow, thick, mixing with the dried blood on his neck.
It didn't look like a fall. It looked like an assault. But it was what she had.
'The arms. Cross his arms over his chest. Like he's sleeping.'
She pulled the right arm, heavy, resisting, and crossed it over his chest. Then the left over it. His hands touched the blood, the torn flesh – but it didn't matter anymore.
'Now the head. Turn it to the side. So he doesn't look like he's staring at the ceiling.'
She turned it. Dan's face was in profile. His eyes still open. She tried to close them with her hand – the cold, limp eyelids wouldn't obey. They stayed half-open, a slit of white showing.
'Leave it.'
She stood up. Looked at the floor.
The footprints.
Her bare feet had left clear marks in the blood. Coming and going. A red path that told the exact story.
'Spread it. Make other marks. Make it look like several people were here.'
She picked up a fallen book – "Lives of the Saints," the leather cover stained red – and dragged it across the floor, creating streaks over the footprints. Then a piece of the broken chair, a wooden leg with rough edges. Then the table leg, heavy, pushing, creating deep grooves.
She made marks in every direction. Over her footprints, over the puddles, over the clean areas. When she finished, the floor looked trampled by several people. No clear footprints. Just chaos.
'Good.'
She was almost leaving.
The body was arranged. The marks, scattered. The scene, chaotic. Maybe it would be enough.
Her eyes scanned the room one last time, looking for something forgotten.
And then they saw it.
Dan's arm was extended, the sleeve of his cassock torn – she herself had torn it while dragging the body. The skin of his forearm was exposed.
And there, on the pale skin, a drawing.
Dark ink, old, faded by time. But still visible.
A tattoo.
Priests don't have tattoos. The rule was clear. The body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Marking it was a sin. It was profanation. It was something for outcasts, for heretics, for people who didn't have God in their hearts.
But there it was.
And the drawing…
Maristela approached. Knelt beside the body. Pulled the torn sleeve to see better.
The symbol was simple, but disturbing.
A person with open arms – like Christ on the cross. The posture of sacrifice, of surrender, of love. But the head… the head wasn't a head.
It was a circle.
A perfect loop, like a rope that had been folded and fused into metal. The circle sat where the face should be. The arms opened wide. The body went straight down.
A person with open arms. With a loop in place of the head.
Maristela's heart raced. Her hand went to the brooch – the pain brought focus, but didn't push away the cold climbing up her spine.
She knew that symbol.
The coins.
In the safe. Seven gold coins, with the same disturbing figure. The open arms. The circle in place of the head.
She reached into her pocket. Felt the cold metal. When she pulled it out, the coin gleamed under the dim lamp light – and the symbol was there. Identical.
The same drawing. The same shape. The same thing.
What did this mean? Why did Dan have the same symbol as the coins? Why did a priest carry on his skin the mark of something that seemed so… pagan?
She pulled the sleeve further. Below the symbol, words. In Latin.
"Pro vita aeterna laboro."
Pro vita aeterna laboro – I work for eternal life.
She didn't know Latin, but the translation came on its own, as if the voice whispered the words in her ear. 'I work for eternal life.'
'How do I know that?' she thought. But the answer didn't come.
Eternal life.
Her hand trembled. The coin gleamed. The symbol on Dan's skin seemed to pulse, alive, waiting.
'What is this?'
The voice didn't answer.
For the first time, the Orphan was silent.
Maristela stayed there, kneeling beside the body, holding the coin, staring at the tattoo.
The silence weighed.
She didn't know what it meant. But she knew, with a cold certainty, that this discovery was bigger than her. Bigger than the murder. Bigger than the escape.
And that, somehow, it connected her to Dan. To the safe. To the coins.
To the man who signed D.R.
She put the coin away. Let go of the sleeve. Stood up.
She needed to get out of there. Needed to think. Needed to survive.
But the question remained, engraved in her mind like the tattoo on dead skin:
'I work for eternal life.' Whose eternal life?