The girl had finally been found.
The sun was nearly setting when the drizzle began to fall harder, soaking the slippery riverbank. The smell of wet earth and moss, usually strong in the air, was now tainted by a faint foul odor drifting around them. A woman's corpse was wedged between slick black rocks, her naked body blue with cold. Her face was no longer intact—the right side had caved inward, exposing the jagged cheekbone, while her left eye, nose, and part of her mouth had been destroyed.
Muddy river water flowed slowly, rocking her long black hair as it floated on the surface. Her body drifted back and forth like a log caught on the rocks, helpless against the current flowing around it.
A crowd of locals stood behind the police line, murmuring and whispering. Some covered their mouths with their hands, scarves, or hijabs, as if the stench of death might crawl down their throats. An elderly woman murmured a quiet prayer, her voice occasionally swallowed by the roar of the river and the voices of the crowd.
A forensic officer crouched down, then drew a deep breath before aiming his camera at the victim's body. The camera flash touched the rigid body lying on its side, its stillness horrifying.
A few moments later, two members of the medical personnel crouched down as well, preparing to lift the victim and place her in a body bag. One of the victim's hands was caught in a gap between the rocks, forcing the personnel to pull harder. The stiff joints made the movement feel rough, causing several onlookers to wince.
Two police officers stood a short distance from the crowd, watching the evacuation with grim expressions. One of them, a heavyset police officer, turned toward his partner. “Could this be the person reported missing three days ago?” His voice was nearly drowned out by the commotion.
“The victim looks young.” His lean partner, with a narrow face, jerked his chin toward the corpse.
“She was reported to be seventeen.”
“Oh. Then it could be her.” The two of them walked toward the body bag, which now lay on top of a stretcher.
Then the heavyset police officer unzipped the bag and shone his flashlight at the victim's face, studying the destroyed features carefully. His partner stood behind him, following the direction of the flashlight's beam.
“If this really is her,” the officer said as he shone the flashlight and examined the face more closely, “someone tried to erase the evidence.” The beam stopped on the right side of the corpse's face.
The drizzle began to turn into rain. At last, the ambulance pulled away slowly, leaving behind the fading commotion and replacing it with murmurs laced with suspicion. They had just found her—the missing girl, returned without a pulse. The police knew this was only the beginning. But what was even more terrifying was that they had found no meaningful clues. Or perhaps… they didn't want to find any.