Free Spirit Animals (Ritual Crime Unit Book 3) by E. E. Richardson

well-tended than the front lawn, a trampled path leading through the long grass to the shed that took up most of the space. It had no windows, and in place of the usual simple bolt the door had a hefty padlock, though someone had already been at it with bolt cutters.
    Pierce approached the closed door, pulling on a pair of evidence gloves from her pocket. “Knock, knock, anybody home?” she announced herself before tugging it open, to no response from within.
    The inside of the shed was lit by a free-hanging incandescent bulb, and had the unavoidably musty, slightly damp scent of seldom-used space. Not the safest of storage conditions for potentially volatile magical items, especially crammed to the rafters as the shed proved to be: wooden shelves along three sides were loaded with occult objects, some of which made her eyebrows rise immediately. That shrunken monkey head hanging from the corner was definitely up to no good, and she didn’t much like the trio of blank-eyed dolls slumped beside it either.
    A few larger pieces including storage chests, stone bowls and a cauldron were stacked in the middle of the floor—which was why it took her a few moments to spot Deepan, crouched down in the corner in front of what seemed to be an antique mirror, its ivory frame carved to resemble a wreath of thorns. The dust sheet that he’d pulled from it still dangled from his left hand, seemingly half forgotten. Pierce whistled softly to draw his attention. “Oi, oi—something interesting?” she asked.
    Still no evidence that he could even hear her, and her mood flipped from mildly amused to wary fast.
    “Deepan,” she barked, much louder this time. “Sergeant Mistry, I am talking to you, son!” She whistled again, a piercing blast. He didn’t so much as twitch in her direction. The whole of his concentration was intently focused on the tarnished surface of the mirror—though she was pretty sure it was something far more sinister than his own reflection that held him so transfixed.
    Pierce edged around the obstacles to get closer to him, wary of falling into too direct a line of sight lest she end up snared by whatever enchantment lay on the mirror. Mirror magic could be nasty stuff, and it probably wasn’t wise to try to move him away from it until she knew what they were dealing with. But how could she figure that out if she couldn’t even look at the thing head-on?
    By fighting fire with fire. She remembered she had a mirror of her own, the small square compact she’d taken to tucking into an inner pocket after a run-in with some possessing spirits a few months ago. If she knew her mirror theory, then a second reflection ought to neutralise the power of the first.
    Unless it amplified it instead. Such were the joys of messing around with unknown artefacts.
    But it was the least risky way of getting the measure of the situation, and whatever that mirror might be doing to Deepan, she doubted it was a good idea to let it continue. There was no saying how long he might have been crouched in front of it already.
    She wasn’t even sure he was still breathing.
    Forcing down the unhelpful instinct to just run forward and drag him away, Pierce unfolded her own compact mirror and angled it over her shoulder to try and see, an even more awkward manoeuvre than trying to get the back view of an outfit. She couldn’t get a clear look at the magic mirror with Deepan’s body in the way, so she pressed closer up against the shelves at the side, jostling a line of stone jars up on the highest shelf and causing the dangling monkey head to swing ominously.
    At last she got the angle right to give her a glimpse of the tarnished mirror, and in it Deepan’s dully reflected face, but it was like trying to see him through a red-tinged fog. At first she thought it was a rusty tint to the mirror, but even as she watched a fresh cloud of brighter red puffed out from the ivory thorns that framed the glass, spreading through the mirror image