Page 22 of The Vampire and the Case of the Hellacious Hag

Delvin shook his head firmly but Baldred countered with a nod. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s acceptable, Leif?’

Leifnodded grimly. ‘Yes, Elder Baldred.’ He glared at us. ‘I’ll be right back. Don’t touch him until I return.’

‘May I take photos before the scene is disturbed?’ Sidnee asked.

Baldred nodded again and Sidnee got busy, taking dozens of photos of the body and the cavern in general. She also took some more general shots showing the route to the body and the direction in which the deceased had been walking.

‘What do you think?’ Gunnar asked me quietly as she worked.

I hesitated. ‘I’m not sure yet, but my gut doesn’t like the hag for this. I can’t put my finger on why. But whether it’s her or not, we’ll find out who killed Alfgar.’

Gunnar smiled at me with satisfaction. ‘Damn right we will.’

Chapter 15

Leif came back with four more dwarves and a stretcher. We backed away as they reverently loaded up the body and carried it away. Another dwarf carefully shovelled the earth that had soaked up the blood into a sack and took that away as well. Sidnee took photos to document their actions.

Liv was smirking at me from the other side of the cavern; of course she was. She’d been a tiny bit nicer during Christmas, but now that the festive season was winding down it seemed that her acerbic self was returning with a vengeance. She was obviously still angry at me for the whole arresting her thing.

I smiled back calmly. I was kind of looking forward to seeing her do her necromantic thing. I crossed my fingers that the dwarves would allow her to raise the dead body, though it felt like a pipe dream at that moment. If the soul really was trapped without the head then the chances were good she’d be able to do it – if they’d let her.

We followed Leif and his helpers to the locker room and they set the stretcher in a space between the rows of lockers. The miners departed, leaving Leif and a couple of other dwarves to oversee the examination.

Fluffy came in quietly. He hadn’t indicated that he’d smelled anything unusual, but it was a new place with many strange odours and people; anyway, I didn’t think he’d indicate anything was amiss with all the dwarves around. Maybe he’d tell us more later when he was in human form. For now he hung back, sensing that the dwarves were wary of him.

‘Leif,’ I asked, ‘did you know Alfgar well? What was his full name?’

‘Of course I knew him well.’ He seemed determined to find fault with everything I said. ‘I know all of my crew well. His full name was Alfgar Simonson.’

‘Thank you.’ I gestured for Fluffy to stand at my side as we went over every inch of the body. Sidnee started at the feet and I started at the neck stub. Lucky me.

I quickly found a stray hair just below Alfgar’s shoulder blade, plucked it up with my tweezers and went to put it in an evidence bag. ‘What are you doing?’ Leif protested.

‘Collecting evidence!’ I was beginning to lose patience. ‘What colour was Alfgar’s hair?’

‘Brown.’

‘This hair is red, so it doesn’t belong to the body. It is evidence.’

Leif looked shocked. ‘No, that can’t be.’

I raised my eyebrows. ‘What can’t be?’

‘The h-hag,’ he stuttered. ‘She doesn’t have red hair.’

‘No, she doesn’t. But it’s a single hair and he could have picked it up anywhere during the day. We’ll consider it together with the other evidence we obtain. However, we will want to interview any of the workers on the list who have red hair.’

‘Red is a very common dwarven hair colour,’ Delvin interjected. His own hair was red. ‘My father’s brown hair is considered rare.’

‘Thank you for that insight.’ I wanted to groan; naturally red hair would be a dime a dozen here. We wouldn’t want it to be too easy, right?

Leif was visibly shaken; he’d been so sure that the hag was guilty because he obviously hated her.

‘I’ve got something,’ Sidnee said excitedly and I looked up. ‘There’s some dirt in his boot treads that doesn’t match the mine surface.’

‘Let me see that,’ Leif insisted.

Sidnee stood back as he squinted at the bottom of Alfgar’s boot. Finally he stood back and nodded. ‘That dirt is from the tailings site.’ My hasty Googling on the way to the mineslast time had taught me that ‘tailings’ was the term given to the waste product of mining. The tailings site was essentially the mine’s dump.

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