I grinned at him, despite his horrible put-down. I’d make a private investigator out of him yet. A grumpy, egotistical private investigator.
“Let’s look at the skin,” I said.
My stomach was already crawling when we entered the adjacent room. “Buffalo Bill would’ve had a field day with this.” I eyed the man’s form. “If he was the right size, he could just slip this skin suit on and go for a stroll.”
Oscar started laughing.
“I don’t know to what you are referring,” Darius said, his eyes moving down the torso, then the legs.
“It’s a movie. Never mind.” I noticed inconsistencies in the thickness of the removed skin, places where it was ripped. “Definitely looks like they used freezing spells. You can see where it was applied, plus the places where the spells overlapped. They probably had a couple going at once. I’d guess our mage was not alone in this. He had people casting the freezing spells for him, while he took care of the spell to capture the energy from the actual skinning.”
“They should’ve easily been able to peel the skin off the muscle,” Darius said, his arms crossed.
“Tell me you have never done this.” I shot him with a glare. “If you have done something like this, we cannot be friends. Even more than we already aren’t friends.”
“If you skin an animal, you cut the pelt away from certain areas, then pull it off the muscle. It comes free pretty easily. I don’t know if humans are the same, but one would think they should be, at least in some areas.”
“Maybe with how the spells were set up, they couldn’t tug it off.” I walked around to the back but didn’t see anything noteworthy. “This must’ve been done over a day, tops.”
“Why do you say that?” Oscar asked, the humor gone from his eyes now. He’d finally realized that we were no joke.
“The spell he used to capture the energy is complex.It takes great focus. Once in place, upsetting its balance would be quite easy. I’d have to ask some friends for more details, but I’ve read that the spell itself is fragile. You can’t touch it, no other spells can touch it, and the caster’s constant focus is needed to keep it in effect. Moreover, the caster is the one collecting the energy, so he’s the one who has to do the actual…crime. Clearly he couldn’t keep it up with all the commotion of the victim.” I ran my finger through the air, indicating the area where the thickness of the…removal mostly leveled out. “He went for the torso, probably because it’s right over the vital areas, in a place where the victim could see the whole thing. That would cause fear as well as pain. Limbs can be ignored to some degree, but it’s harder to ignore a knife over your heart. So then, the spell to collect the victim’s turmoil would have had to be—”
“Right around his head,” Darius finished for me.
“Yes, but it would need to extend in a sheet over the place our guy was cutting. Also a bit away so the other spells didn’t touch it, and our perp didn’t back into it… There was a lot going on. This was clearly not easy. So yes, he must’ve gotten whatever energy he could, but he couldn’t keep up, the victim died, and he had to rush to get the blood before it congealed. I’m not sure why he kept going with the skin after that, but blood would still hold the power, just not as purely. Putting it over the circle lines would help them call a stronger demon. Why they wanted to call a high level four, I do not know, but this probably let them do it.”
“It is hard to take any of this seriously,” Oscar said with a straight face.
“We’re just getting started, Oscar. Wait until I run into the guys who did this. You’ll see some fighting you didn’t think existed outside of TV.” I stepped back and turned toward the door. Now that we’d gotten the analysis portion out of the way, the gravity of what was in front of me would sink in again, and I’d have anotherewmoment.
“There isn’t much to see at the dump site,” Oscar said. “They were pretty clean in the drop-off. We have an imprint of a boot and some blood from the body. I don’t know how that would help you.”
“I don’t either, but it’s worth a look. Otherwise, we’ll be hanging around here waiting for another of these crimes to happen. I really don’t want to do that.”
Chapter Fourteen
The dump site was a seaport on the route from the airport to the city. Huge metal shipping containers of all colors were stacked high. A massive, empty barge rested beside the dock, waiting to be loaded. Two school buses topped with piles of strapped-down containers patiently awaited their dismissal.
As we got further in and wound through the cargo, I saw a few trucks waiting for a crane to load up their trailers. Work was slow this late at night, but some was still going on.
“As you saw, you have to go through the check-in,” Oscar said as we parked and got out of the car. “But since all the containers are inspected and locked up before they get here, security isn’t as tight as it should be. Tell them you’re delivering lunch to your spouse and you can get through without much hassle. Not to mention there are sneakier ways to get in that skirt the cameras. This isn’t exactly a closed-off location.”
I wandered around the containers, all orderly, and the area, mostly clean. Nothing magical pulsed throughthe air.
“The dumpster is back through here.” Oscar motioned to the right and started walking.
I followed with Darius by my side, his hand coming to rest on the small of my back.
“What’s up?” I asked quietly, identifying the various sounds, most of which were linked to water. We were on a huge dock, after all. In the distance, the rush of cars moving along the freeway provided background noise.
“I am merely being cautious. You are unpredictable. If something jumps out, I never know what you will do. Touch allows me to keep my eyes up while monitoring you at the same time.”
I nodded and swung my eyes to the right, peering into the deep shadows and looking for anything that might be amiss. Yellowed light showered the cement from poles lining the path. Up ahead was a squat building, lit with security lights.
“Behind here.” Oscar squinted up at one of the light poles. “I always forget to bring the big flashlight.” He extracted a small flashlight from his pocket and clicked it on. The weak white beam made a spotlight on the ground in front of him. “It’ll work. They keep this place pretty clean. There’s nothing to trip on. Just stay close so you can see.”
He clearly didn’t know that both of us could see in the dark. We didn’t enlighten him. Instead, we silentlyfollowed him around a stack of containers. Not much further along, we entered a passageway between two towering rows of containers. The light from the open space cut off, leaving us in the murky blackness that criminals and unscrupulous characters favored.
