Free Never Burn A Witch: A Rowan Gant Investigation by M. R. Sellars Page A

sickeningly
malodorous potpourri. Every step closer to the scene intensified
the stench by yet another factor.
    “We didn’t get a call on this till a couple’a
hours ago,” Carl said, still continuing with his rundown. “But
judgin’ from the pile of ashes and the amount of damage to the
body, we’re guessin’ she was torched sometime after midnight.
Probably real early this morning.”
    “I suppose it’d be too much to hope for a
witness,” Ben spat the rhetorical comment as we rounded a wide
stone pillar and came face to face with the unbridled horror.
    Shriveled black patches of skin and cooked
flesh were drawn tight over the gnarled skeleton held partially
erect in the fire pit. The jaw of the charred skull locked open in
a silent, agonized scream, hideously baring blackened teeth where
the softer, unsupported flesh had been completely seared away.
Surprisingly, more than enough of the torso remained intact to show
with relative certainty that the corpse was in fact that of a
woman.
    “Jeezus...” Ben exclaimed, unable to pry his
stare from the disfigured remains.
    “Coroner wanted to take her on in,” Carl
offered, “but I wanted to wait until you got here.”
    Though an autopsy was yet to be performed, I
knew that she had been alive when the fire was ignited around her.
In my mind, I could see the flames licking up her body, first
blistering her skin and then consuming it with an appetite
unmatched by a starving animal. The fire enveloped her, searing her
nose as she fought not to breathe, only to then be sucked deep into
her lungs when she could no longer hold her breath. She wanted to
cry out. To scream. But she couldn’t. She had been gagged.
    The barrier had eventually burned away, but
by then it was too late. I could sense without a doubt that she had
been aware of her fate to the very end.
    Color and light began to drain from the scene
around me in a glittering whirlpool, and I knew I was being pulled
into a place I didn’t dare go. Without even trying I was about to
channel her last moments on this physical plane. Consciously, I
knew that without a solid anchor to pull me back, this was one I
could not survive.
    Steeling myself against the onslaught of
desperate emotions and excruciating unearthly pain, I latched
myself onto the nearest thing I could find.
    “Rowan!” Ben yelped, finally breaking his
stare as I grasped his arm and stumbled forward. He took hold of my
shoulders and steadied me before I could plunge face first onto the
concrete.
    Standing on the opposite side, Carl came to
my aid as well. “Hey, Row, are you all right?”
    “Thanks...” I muttered to them both as I
shakily regained my balance. “Sorry about that.”
    “You were goin’ all Twilight Zone , weren’t ya’?” Ben asked. I’m sure
that having witnessed similar episodes before he knew the signs all
too well.
    “Yeah,” I sighed. “But I think I caught it in
time.”
    “You sure you’re okay?” Carl interjected in
his usual fatherly tone.
    “I’ll be fine.”
    “I hate ta’ ask,” Ben queried in an
apologetic tone, “but ya’ didn’t happen to see the asshole who did
it when you went... Well, went wherever it is ya’ go when ya’ do
that.”
    “No. I wish I had.”
    The flesh rending pain that had started as a
simple itch on my forearm was eating at me with a vengeance. I
could feel my eyes watering as I fought to suppress tears.
    “Did you find a Bible anywhere on the scene?”
I queried Detective Deckert while attempting to ignore the
torment.
    “No. No Bible.” He shook his head. “But funny
you should mention that.”
    “Why?”
    “Well,” Carl ventured and extended his arm,
pointing toward the corpse. “The real reason I called was the
symbols.”
    My eyes followed his finger down to the
stone base of the fire pit. There, skillfully drawn in matte black
spray-paint, was the Christian symbol that had become painfully
familiar over the past few hours. The Monogram of Christ