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Trinity
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Dietrich was clearly not happy right now. And I didn't blame him. He knew about these symbols. He knew what they meant and where they were from. He had a reason to be upset about them and possibly even to be afraid of them.
“What I want to know is, what these symbols have to do with our victim? What purpose do they serve? And are they on all of the victims? And if they are on all of the victims, then is it like a signature? Or does it have a different purpose? There are so many variables that we need to look at here.” Reece was explaining what was going on in his head as we all tried to figure out what was going on in these places and what had happened to these people.
“Well, we would need the rest of the files to know if the marks are on all the victims. We can, however, determine if these marks are on all the victims that we have the files for.” I pulled another file toward me, the one that Reece hadn't been holding on to. “Let's see, this victim is from Scotland. The village they were from was called Gennenin and it is close to Ayr. Her name was Darcey McCormack and she was nineteen years old. She had the same marks carved into her body as Niclas did. She also had her throat cut and her heart removed. It looks to me like the method of this kill was the same as the last one. This here is what I would call a serial killer. Assuming that all the kills were the same.”
I was doing my best to sound clinical and not let the facts of this case get to me. I want to relay the information while trying not to let the fact that this gruesome murder, of which I was seeing graphic images of, had happened to someone who was supposed to be an immortal like me. This person was not what you would call 'easy prey' for a human. This person would have to have been targeted by someone capable of doing this to someone strong and capable.
.....
“Was the victim another wolf?” Dietrich asked me as he rubbed at his temples. I could tell that this information was getting to him. He was having a hard time processing that these people were using symbols that he knew about. Or at least, I was assuming that was the issue here.
“No. This victim was a black bear. She may have been a woman, but she would have been strong and capable of protecting herself. This tells me that the killer was either stronger than her or had somehow incapacitated her in some way. Whoever they are, they know what they are doing and that is not a good thing. This makes them a danger to so many people in the world.” I tried not to shudder as I inspected the images more. I needed to put this file down. I needed to move on. “Reece, what happened to the third victim.” I didn't want to look into that file. I wanted to have someone else take on that responsibility. I needed them to. I would listen, and I would look at the pictures later but, for right now, I just needed them to tell me what had happened.
“Yeah, let's take a look.” I think that Reece knew that, after looking at the other two files, I needed to take a break. I needed to not be the one looking at it right now. I needed him to be the one seeing the horror for me. “This third file is for a man named Krishna Shah. He lived in a small outlying community in Chukhung, Nepal. He was a witch doctor that worked as a local healer. He was forty-seven years old and well liked by his community. He had the same symbols carved onto his head and his chest. His throat had been slit and his heart was removed, just like the other victims. However, Krishna was also burned in several places. His hands, feet and the top of his head. There was also a brand in the shape of a sword burned over top of his naval area. This victim had more done to the body, thankfully it all appears to be post mortem. However, it is still clear that the signature, or the way that they were killed, is the same. If this isn't the same exact person, it is someone who knows exactly what they are doing to the other victims.” Reece sounded like he was giving a speech, something that he was just reciting and not emotionally involved in.
“This victim was in Asia while the others were in the United Kingdom. When were they killed? What were the dates?” I started to pull the first two toward me again. The dates alone would be able to tell us if it were even possible for this to be the same killer. “Niclas was killed on July the twentieth.” I looked at the first report and then checked the date for Darcey's file. “And this one was on July the twenty-fifth. Is very possible for them to have been killed by the same person.”
“Well, Krishna was also killed on July the twenty-fifth. So that tells me that we have at least two different killers.” Reece set the file down and looked up at me. I could see the horror that he had seen in that file reflected in his eyes. He knew now why I had wanted someone else to be the one to do that for me.
“We need to get a timeline going. We have to know when the victims were murdered, that will tell us how many possible killers we have. At the very least, it will tell us how many different groups of killers we have. We also need to find out if the murders that were reported about on the news were humans, or if all the kills were from our community. Dietrich, I want you to contact the different covens in your kingdom. Find out if there were any murders among your people. If anyone has gone missing all of a sudden or just haven't been located in a while. We need to know if these murders are limited to my kingdom or not.” I was giving orders to the others as I thought about what needed to be done. This was going to be a busy time for us, but we needed to make sure that we handled this with care and precision. I was not about to let these killers get away with this, but I wasn't about to be reckless either. “These people are obviously capable of killing people that are not human. And they seem to be good at it too. We all need to be careful. We need to make sure that we are thorough and that we don't miss anything.”
“I agree. We need to make sure that we don't overlook a single piece of evidence. These people deserve our help, they deserve justice.” Dietrich's voice was saddened by the information that we had received. “I will call my people immediately following this meeting. I will find out if any of the vampires have disappeared. We need a complete list of victims, and that includes their species as well.”
“Agreed. We need to start compiling all the data that we can get and comb through it for anything and everything that will be able to help us find these people.” Gabriel was now looking at the file for Darcey McCormack. Being the man that was the most analytical of the group, and the one most used to dealing with large quantities of information, I just knew that he was going to be a valuable asset to this team.
“I am going to set aside one of the conference rooms for us to use. It will be off limits to everyone that is not part of this investigation. I don't want to spread panic among the people in the castle or the surrounding areas. The less that they know for the time being, the better.” I was already trying to figure out which room would be best for us to use, and let's not forget about deciding on which protection spells to add to the room. It needed to stay locked against the staff and other potential visitors to the room.
“Let's not drag our feet on this at all.” Reece was on his feet again. I knew that this was to make it appear that he had more authority in the situation, but it was also something that he did when he was nervous. He needed to pace and to burn off some of the energy and steam that was coursing through him. “The sooner we fix this situation, the better.”
“Agreed.” Just about all of the men in the room nodded and spoke at the same time. Rawlynne and I, the only women in the room, looked at each other and then all the men around us. I knew that this wouldn't be over too quickly. If these people were going to be that easy to catch, they would not have been able to do this in the first place. These people were smart. They were skilled. And they were organized. They would not be caught so easily. It was going to take everything that we had just to be able to stop them. And it was going to take me leaving my family to investigate personally. That was something I had managed to avoid doing for a long time now. More than ten years to be exact. Now though, my people needed me and I would be there for them.
