An arm, its hand holding a pistol, lay across the room.
“Have forensics check that gun and see if it’s been fired,” I said. Novak nodded, scribbling on his little notepad.
The living room held a nightmare scene. Two demons had been shredded, and they also showed evidence of being shot in the back of the head from close range. I walked over to an oni who was lying on his back. I had fought an oni once, and he had been damned hard to kill. They were ferocious demons with extreme strength and tougher than a tree. He showed signs of having been tortured before he was killed. That meant someone or something had to immobilize him. Since I didn’t see any kind of physical restraints, that meant magik.
His buddy was an ogre, almost as large and tough but a lot uglier. Again, not an easy being to kill.
The human in the kitchen would only be identified by DNA. Fingerprints, facial pictures, and dental records were useless, since he or she didn’t have any fingers, teeth, or face. I didn’t spend any time studying the body or the room. The human in the next room had tried to run, and most of the damage he took was to his back. Of course, being disemboweled through the back was pretty gruesome. The gunshot to the back of his head was obviously superfluous and done post-mortem.
We found the vampires in an upstairs room. Both had been extensively tortured. Whoever had come into the house had strong magik and had taken their time. Vampires weren’t as difficult to kill as demons, but they were tough. The torture had me baffled. A message, or a need for information?
The women were in a room down the hall. A woman in her apparent thirties had been gutted, and her heart was missing. A lot of demons considered human hearts tasty snacks. Two young girls—probably in their late teens—were the only bodies that were intact. Their necks were broken, and neither had been shot.
“What do you make of that?” Novak asked.
“Business,” I said. “Taking care of witnesses. Check their ages. My bet is these girls were being trafficked. We might find them in the Missing Persons database. The woman looks familiar, but I can’t place her.”
The last human and another demon were in another bedroom on the second floor. The demon was another oni, and it looked like he and the young boy had been in bed together. I doubted it was consensual on the boy’s part. That’s where they died, but no telling if the boy was killed by the oni, or something else.
“We’re missing a demon,” I said, counting the bodies we had encountered.
“In the basement, ma’am,” the uniform who had followed us through the house said.
“Lead on, Sergeant.”
The unfinished basement had a damp, musty smell. A few molding boxes sat against the wall when we reached the bottom of the rickety staircase. Not a part of the house that was used very often.
My sense of smell led me to the room on our left even before the uniformed cop pointed to it. I stopped in the doorway and looked around. What we had seen upstairs didn’t prepare me for the occupant of that room.
“What the hell?” Novak breathed.
“Yeah.” I might have made a mistake when I met Ashvial by thinking he was a major demon instead of a demon lord, but the dead demon we found was at least a major demon. He had also been tortured, but by magik. It was scary to contemplate what kind of being was strong enough magikally to confine, torture, and kill a major demon.
The light-blue skin was common for a frost demon, and the body’s limbs were twisted in weird ways, bones broken. His skin was scorched in places, blistered and black. And the expression on his face told me that he died in terror and pain.
I realized that Whittaker had plenty of time to study the pictures he’d shown me, while I had briefly glanced at them. No wonder he was concerned.
“Gods,” Novak said. He approached the body, looking it over. “How did he die?”
“Take a look at the ears.” An orangish sludge had run out of the demon’s ears and congealed. “I think that’s his brain. My bet is that whatever killed him cooked his brain inside his skull.”
“What has that kind of power?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” My thoughts flashed to Ashvial. A demon lord or maybe one of the Fae or a mage lord. I certainly didn’t have the power to control and kill a major demon, not even with my enhancements. Using magitek devices, I could manage it, but I wasn’t carrying things like that around with me. Maybe I should rethink that.
Chapter 19
The tall, husky uniformed sergeant had followed us into the basement. When we finished examining the body and the room, he asked, “Would you like to inventory the drugs? I’ve kept everyone out of that room, but forensics wants in.”
“Yes,” I responded. “Novak? Sounds right up your alley.”
He gave me a sardonic grin and a half salute. “Yes, ma’am, Lieutenant, ma’am.”
The uniform frowned and shot me a look, evidently either unhappy with Novak’s attitude or afraid that I would blow up.
I didn’t say anything, not sure how I should handle the situation. They trooped back upstairs, leaving me alone with the dead demon and my thoughts.
Whittaker had nailed it. Gangland hit. Rifter drugs and human trafficking. A sudden thought occurred to me, and I quickly climbed the stairs and went looking for the uniformed sergeant.
I found him with Novak in a room that had originally probably been a study or some sort of sitting room. An open cabinet sat against one wall, and I could see vials of liquid and packages of powder on the shelves.
“Sarge,” I called out, “did you find any money?”
He shook his head and pointed to a safe in the corner. The door was a mangled mess, and
