I held my ground and tipped my head back to look him in the eye. He should be smart enough to behave here, and if he wasn’t, I had more witnesses to his poor conduct. For a moment I considered mentioning his suspension but decided against it. The idea was to diffuse the situation. In a few hours he could get the news from Smith.

“Agent Mitchell called me in.” I motioned over my shoulder with my thumb.

He didn’t even look at who was behind me. “That’s not how you are assigned to cases. You need to stand down until I determine if this case needs a witch.”

“You’re behind. A memo went out last night.” Mitchell squeezed herself between us.

I backed up to give her room, glad to have the staring contest over.

For the first time, Floyd hesitated.

“‘Agents are to use their discretion in determining when to call in Agent Kelsey Pine. She will make a further assessment as to the application of magic and her ability. Be advised there are limits to every agent’s ability. Agent Pine will operate to maximize her effect, which may mean minimizing magical output. —SAS Tim Smith.’ Take it up with him if you don’t like what I’ve done.” She took a step forward, and he moved back. “As of an hour ago, I’m coordinating the response between Nashville Police and the TBI. You can stand by the door and help with trash.”

“You can’t do that,” he snarled.

He wasn’t very smart because the officers behind him were tense, and the vampire had glided forward several feet. I was happy to be far enough away to avoid another punch, but this time, I had a spell ready, just in case.

Mitchell leaned forward until their faces were almost touching. “You don’t outrank me. This is my case and my scene, so I can tell you to get out of the way or just get out.”

Floyd puffed up.

I slid my wand out of the sheath.

I don’t know what Floyd would’ve done because his phone rang shrilly. He yanked it out of the belt clip, caught sight of the number, and paled. He answered as he turned and walked out of the building. “Agent Colten Floyd speaking.”

Everyone watched him until the door closed behind him.

My hand shook as I shoved my wand back in the sheath. A few shallow breaths, because I wasn’t willing to inhale these odors too deeply again, steadied me. I owed Agent Mitchell and whoever was on the other end of that phone call. Without them, well, I doubted Floyd would’ve listened to reason about the dangers of the magic on the remains.

“Are you okay?” Agent Mitchell’s eyes were full of concern.

“I’ll be fine.”

She raised an eyebrow.

I sighed heavily. “Thank you. I don’t know how that would’ve gone without you.”

She shrugged, like it wasn’t an issue, but also checked the door. “What’s his problem?”

“I honestly don’t know. I met him the first time yesterday morning.” Whatever issues Floyd had with me wasn’t restricted to my magic. It almost felt personal, but I didn’t know any other Floyds. Maybe I could leverage the assault and ensure we weren’t on the same cases in the future.

“Do your job. I’ll deal with him.” Mitchell rubbed her temple. “I need to make some phone calls.” She headed outside, stopping to strip off her booties and gloves.

The officers and techs were talking quietly, and while I could hear some of it, I didn’t need to. Floyd had made sure we would be fueling gossip for a while. Perfect. Just perfect. Half the people would think we’d been lovers and the other half would think not being lovers was the reason for the fight. Since I didn’t even know why we had a problem, I couldn’t set them straight… even if they’d believe me.

The best thing I could do now was be professional. It had zero chance of outweighing the scene Floyd had made, but it might temper their views.

“All right,” I spoke loud enough to be heard clearly over their conversations. I got their attention—as well as plenty of speculating looks. “I’m sorry about the interruption. Can anyone here do any bite mark identification?”

The three techs shook their heads, which was what I expected from them. One of the humans spoke up. “I wouldn’t be able to tell one type of damage from another.”

“I can identify human and vampire bite marks,” the vampire offered. Her pale blond hair was in a tidy ponytail under her Nashville Police cap. A few inches shorter than me and slender, she would’ve been considered delicate as a human.

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“That’s a start.” I turned and headed back to the remains.

Before we turned the corner, I hesitated. Floyd showing up wasn’t any excuse to be rude. “I’m sorry for being curt.”

“After that exchange, I would be on edge as well.” She started to offer her hand, but realized her glove was streaked with blood and turned her palm up in a what-can-you-do motion. “Officer Talula Wilson.”

“Kelsey Pine.” Most of the normal social graces didn’t fit this situation, which wasn’t the most comfortable feeling after all the time my mom had spent drilling me in southern manners. “Before you take a look, I did find traces of magic. I know you know this for forensic reasons, but it also applies with magic. Don’t touch anything. Try not to get within a couple of inches.”

Wilson’s eyebrow arched. “Could you tame the magic first?”

I considered, tipping my head from side to side. “Maybe, but what I see is concerning. It looks to me as though the body was eaten. Most creatures that would eat a body wouldn’t have magic.”

“Ah.” Wilson’s face cleared and she held up a finger. “You are trying to determine the connection between the lack of flesh and the magic so you can better work your magic.”

“Exactly. Are they separate or connected? I may never know for sure, but if this a ritual I haven’t encountered, the more I know, the better.” Not just for the criminal case, but for everyone here as well. The blood magic would need to be purified or contained. It could also be masking other spells, ones I would do well to avoid.

Wilson rounded the corner ahead of me and crouched beside the remains. She started her examination at the feet and worked her way up.

The second sight of the remains was just as powerful as the first and just as horrible. I wanted to be unaffected, and while the sight wouldn’t haunt my dreams, the suffering would. Death alone wouldn’t create blood magic this potent. This person had been alive when the creature attacking it had taken the first bites. They’d struggled, adding fear and desperation to the pain. A heady mix for anyone who sourced their power from death.

“They were alive.” Wilson looked up at me and noted my lack of surprise. “But you knew that already.” She returned to her examination.

“It’s the intent behind the injuries that I question.” A human might have thought I was crazy, but Wilson understood.

“Not human or vampire.” She made a sour face. “Flesh does not appeal to us in this way.”

“Nor to most humans.” If this was a new method of creating blood magic, it was one of the more horrific I’d seen.

She stood up in one of those “too quick for the eye to follow” moves vampires did so casually. “I do agree, carnivorous animal. Large canines, though that doesn’t rule out a cat. Marks from their teeth have left impressions on the lower ribs and some organs.”

“Shifter or animal?” It made a difference as far as intent. A starved animal might eat a person, though I couldn’t think of one native to this area that could consume so much meat in one sitting or would leave the intestines and other organs behind.

“The jaw seems large.” She shook her head. “I am no expert to tell anyone what made those marks, and the medical examiner wouldn’t much care for me doing his job, but they are large marks. Though some of the cuts, especially on the torso, seem to be made with a blade.”

“One eating and one cutting?” After some time with the body, the medical examiner could tell me, but that wasn’t much help now.

“Perhaps.”

If that was the case, there could be a pile of tissue somewhere. “Has anyone found body parts or blood in other areas?”

Wilson’s eyes narrowed. “Yes, on the other side.”

“I need to see that too.”

As I followed her, I tried to understand what had happened. Something had eaten the dead man, and if Wilson was right about the tool marks, either the same person or a different one had also used a blade on the victim. But why? There were tidier ways of killing. Neither blood magic nor cannibalism required this mess.

Since I could still see magic, I noticed the streaks and pools of blood had glints of spells, but none of them were corrupted with blood and death magic. Whatever had twisted the spells to feed off the victim had done so in the corner, on this side.

We passed by the office. Other than a streak of blood on the outside of the window, it appeared untouched. Behind the glass, tidy stacks of papers and a computer with a ball bouncing back and forth across the screen waited for the day to start.

The victim could be an employee or even the owner. He wouldn’t be back to work. His family was probably waiting for him to come home, and it would be days before they had any real answers.

The thoughts brought more reality to my job and hardened my resolve. Whoever he was, he deserved a proper funeral. No matter how valuable the magical evidence, I’d see that his body was purified so they could give him a proper send-off.

Wilson stopped and pointed in a corner between the office and a piece of equipment. After the other side of the warehouse, this simply didn’t have any impact. Two hunks of flesh, likely from thighs or another muscular part of the body judging from the lack of organs, were laying on the ground in small pools of blood.

A light tint of magic covered both of them, but they were completely untouched by whatever had twisted the spells on the other side. This I could investigate safely.

I drew a strand of magic out of myself, shaping it into a slender cord. The tendril moved at my command, hovering over the hunk of flesh closest to me. The spell on the body chunk was quiet, content to simply be. Taking a deep breath, I touched the probe to the magic. It was too fractured for me to get much from it, but the parts I could identify seemed to be some type of a stimulant spell, though stimulating what, I couldn’t say.

Since the flesh itself wouldn’t tell me much, other than the fact it was dead, I pulled the probe back and tiptoed around the blood to the second chunk of flesh. Up close, the flesh wasn’t a usual human tone but a winter green.

This had belonged to a fey.

I let the probe hang just above the spell, and the slivers of magic felt like what I’d found on the last piece. When the probe connected with the magical remnants, I found an almost identical spell fragment. This one had a bit more of the commands about what was being stimulated, something inside a person. Given what I’d seen so far, I was afraid hunger for flesh was what had been stimulated.

With that cheerful thought, my stomach clenched. That was it. Steak was off the menu.