Free Witch for Hire by N. E. Conneely Page B

stone.  
    The sight of her disfigured body made my stomach roll. Only a few feet from her, next to me, were the twisted remains of a feed silo with two legs still in the concrete pad. The chicken house was on the far side of the silo, missing a section of wall and roof. Still avoiding her, I reached out with a few fingers of power. There was nothing magical about this. It looked like the grain silo had exploded. The explosion had killed the troll and a lot of chickens. Several escaped chickens were eating the dead ones, as the rest roamed the farm. Nothing about this was my problem.
    "White," he looked over at me. "This wasn't magical. I don't think there is anything I can do here. That's a troll, so we're down to seven missing trolls."
    "I agree about the blast. You can go—"
    "Body!"  
    All of us swiveled, looking for where to go. We spotted one of the guys who had been examining the surrounding area waving his flashlight. Everyone, but the officers on guard duty and the medical examiner, took off running. The officer was at the edge of the woods, just past the end of the partly exploded chicken house. All of us walked the last few feet, trying not to step on anything important. One officer took a look at the body, or the shadowy shape we all thought was a body, before heading back for a flood light. The eight people standing around the body pulled out flashlights, trying to see as much as they could without disturbing the remains.  
    The lights trailed over the corpse, revealing a dark haired young man with a goatee. As the lights played over his form I could see deep bites on his neck and shoulders. The bite to his neck had bled, but not as much as I'd have thought a fatal wound would bleed. With a shift in the flashlights, his nearly severed arm caught my attention. It looked to have been ripped from his body.  
    I wasn't an expert, but it looked like the kid had bled out after a troll had snacked on him; I was betting on the troll over by the chicken coop. What I didn't understand, was why the troll would have stopped eating this guy and left him alone. From what I knew of trolls, they were more likely to take food with them than leave it for scavengers. I wouldn't have thought an explosion would deter a troll from food. A troll would be more likely to move the location of its dinner party.  
    I gently nudged White. "I'm going back to the car." If I didn't leave soon I would be ill.  
    Walking back, I thought longingly of sleep. There was nothing I could do here. The police had investigators who would look into this mess. My job was to get the map working so the trolls could be tracked and captured before another incident occurred.
    "I know you don't see why I'm asking questions, or why you're all going to be escorted to the station, but there's been an explosion on this property. There's a dead troll, and we've just found a dead human. I tried asking questions at the house. Ya'll looked at each other and didn't say anything, so you'll be going to the station." The officer had herded four kids and two adults to the cars. I guessed the adults were the parents of at least one of the kids.  
    I sat on the warm hood of the car. It was the perfect temperature to keep me warm while I watched the officer call extra policemen back to their cars. Each car had a child shoved in the back, with the parents left over. White volunteered to drive the adults since we weren't needed here.  
    It was a much quieter drive back. The radio wasn't as busy and none of us talked. White and I didn't want to talk about the case in front of possible suspects, and they didn't want to say anything that we could later use against them.
    Back at the office, I checked on the spell map right away. Most of the glowing circles had disappeared, but there were still more than seven. I counted twenty-three circles. It was showing more than trolls, but twenty three was much more manageable than over a hundred. I couldn't be sure what was closer to