Harm None: A Rowan Gant Investigation (17 page)

“What’s your name?” I asked him.

“Bill,” he answered, still pleased.

I motioned to the corner of the room.
“Detective Deckert, could you get the lights please?”

He nodded and switched off the overhead
lights. Felicity picked up on the cue and responded by switching on
the slide projector.

“Let’s step over here out of the way, Bill,”
I told the young detective as I slid the rostrum to one side.

Once we had moved, Felicity tapped a switch
on the slide projector’s remote control, and the tray advanced,
audibly dropping a transparency into the beam of light. The
auto-focus kicked in, and a larger than life image of the Pentacle
from Karen Barnes’ murder scene glowed back at us.

“Can you tell me what we’re looking at,
Bill?” I asked him.

“It’s a star,” he told me. “What Detective
Storm said, ya know, a Pentacle.”

“Very good,” I said. “And what does it
mean?”

“Whaddaya talkin’ about?” he asked, his voice
somewhat less confident than before.

“What is the inherent meaning of the symbol,
Detective?” I asked again.

“Oh, yeah, that.” He shuffled slightly. “Well
it means worship the devil and Satan and stuff like that.”

“Sorry,” I stated apologetically. “Wrong
answer.”

I motioned to Felicity in the dim light
provided by the image reflecting from the screen, and the slide
changed. Now the words that had been inscribed on the walls of both
murder scenes brightly stared back at us.

“And these words, Detective,” I continued,
“‘All Is Forgiven.’ Can you tell me why the killer inscribed them
at both scenes?”

“That’s easy,” he returned. “He’s forgiving
the victims.”

“Hmmm. A little closer but sorry, wrong
again. Next slide please.”

Suddenly the wall was lit up with the
sickening image of Karen Barnes’ flayed torso, her glazed eyes
gaping back at us.

“Can you tell me why the killer excised the
victim’s skin, Detective...?” I received no answer.
“Detective?”

I turned and saw the young man facing away
from the image, breathing heavily and obviously fighting back
nausea. I decided that I had made my point and that he was no
longer nearly as pleased with himself. I motioned across the room;
the lights came back on and the projector shut down.

“Go back to your seat,” I told him, then
turned and took my place back at the podium.

Ben was grinning at me when I looked up at
him, and Detective Deckert flashed me a smile with a surreptitious
thumbs up. The rest of the detectives in the room remained quiet as
my heckler returned to his seat. A good number of them looked just
as green as he did.

“That,” I began, “is why you
should listen to me. If you want to catch this guy, you need to
know
why
he is
doing what he is doing. And, that is what I’m here for.

“I’m going to be straight up with you. I
really don’t give a damn if you like me or not. I don’t expect you
to believe in my religion or follow its covenants. What I do expect
is for you to give me the respect that I deserve and recognize the
fact that I just might be able to answer some questions that you
can’t. I’m here to help you, not entertain you.

“Look, I’ll be the first one to admit that
I’m not an expert criminal psychologist or anything like that. What
I have to say is simply my interpretation of the facts available
based on my knowledge of the Wiccan religion. As I said, knowing
the whys and wherefores behind what the killer is doing just might
prove useful in catching him.” I paused to let my words settle.
“Now, I’m sorry if I made you look like an ass, Bill, but you
seemed rather intent on acting like one even without my help... So,
can we get down to business and figure out a way to catch this
son-of-a-bitch before he kills again?”

A grumble of assent rolled through the room.
I could tell that the majority of them still weren’t happy about
having me involved in the investigation, but at the same time, I
think they realized I might be able to shed some light on certain
aspects of the cases.

“Fine,” I continued. “I’ll begin with telling
you something that I am sure you already know. You are dealing with
a very unstable individual. The second thing I will tell you is
what you aren’t dealing with here... What you aren’t dealing with
is a Witch.”

I paused and waited for the chairs to quit
shifting and the whispers to subside.

“If you will allow me to
explain,” I told them. “I am not saying that the person committing
these murders is not attempting to practice some type of ritual
magick, in fact, I definitely believe that that is exactly what he
is doing. I also believe that he thinks the rituals used by a
practitioner of The Craft play some part in it. This is very simply
not true. An actual practicing Wiccan, or Witch, holds to a very
specific covenant within the religion. That covenant is to
Harm None
. Witches do not,
I repeat, DO NOT sacrifice people or animals in their rituals. The
reason I’m telling you this is that it’s going to be very easy for
you to point your finger at anyone who might happen to be a Wiccan
practitioner, simply because this killer is mimicking one of our
rituals. I really would like to avoid that. Not only would it cause
undue grief for innocent individuals, it would be extremely
counterproductive. For example, just because lemons are yellow and
tennis balls are yellow, it doesn’t mean you can make lemonade out
of tennis balls...What I’m really trying to get at is that just
because one mentally unstable individual is using the symbols of
the Wiccan religion and committing violent murders, it doesn’t mean
that all Wiccans are psycho serial killers. Don’t put blinders on
and follow that kind of distorted logic because it’s not going to
get us anywhere.”

They were looking back at me a bit more
attentively than earlier. I didn’t know if I had convinced them,
but I hadn’t lost them, and at this stage of the game, I had the
feeling that this was all I could hope for.

I motioned to Detective Deckert and Felicity
once more, and again the room was pitched into darkness. Instantly,
the slide projector came to life, clicking rapidly as my wife
backed the tray to the beginning.

“This, as we have already established, is a
Pentacle. In this position, with a single point at the top, it
represents man and life. It is a very common symbol in the Wiccan
religion. If this were to be turned one hundred-eighty degrees so
that there were two points on top, it would then be referred to as
a Pentagram. Some cults have taken it upon themselves to assign a
meaning of evil and darkness to the Pentagram, claiming it
represents Satan. Notice the horns and the pointed goatee.” I
indicated the various points on the screen, “Factually, this is
inaccurate; however, it has become widely accepted as true over the
centuries. That’s probably where you got your misinformation,
Bill.”

I stepped away from the podium and into the
path of the slide projector. The image took up a large portion on
the wall, and I was able to physically point out aspects without
entirely blocking the beam of filtered light.

“In this instance, an upright Pentacle was
inscribed as part of a ritual known as an Expiation spell. This
spell, or ritual, is particularly Wiccan and is the one that the
killer has mimicked with some notable variations. Next slide
please...” The projector clicked and chunked as the first image was
ejected and the second one dropped in its place. “These words, ‘All
Is Forgiven,’ are also a part of this ritual. The Pentacle and the
words were all inscribed at both crime scenes. As Detective Storm
already told you, the victim’s blood was used to draw the symbol
and letters. This would be one of the deviations I mentioned a
moment ago. The other would be that instead of using wine or water
for the spell, the killer once again used the victim’s blood...The
fact that this was done, shows that this second ritual was
performed after the murder. This correlates with the fact that an
Expiation spell is used as something of a ‘self-atonement’
ritual—similar to penance given in a confessional. This leads me to
believe that the killer is feeling remorse for what he’s done and
is seeking to relieve the guilt.

“Next slide.” Once again the projector
rotated the tray and displayed the grisly image of Karen Barnes’
mutilated corpse. “The method of killing has involved ritual
flaying in both cases, followed by cutting the throat in the case
of Ariel Tanner and removal of the heart in the case of Karen
Barnes.”

“What’s the point?” a voice asked. “Is he
some kind of sadist or something?”

“While that wouldn’t surprise me,” I
answered, “the point behind skinning the victim is to bring them to
a heightened sense of pain and fear before their death. From what I
have been able to research, our killer appears to be attempting to
invoke, or call forth, some spirit or daemon. This, he apparently
believes, requires a human sacrifice and requires that the
sacrifice be aware of the process. Whatever it is that he desires
to call forth apparently feeds on pain and fear.”

“I thought you said you Witches didn’t do
shit like that” another voice came out of the dark.

“We don’t,” I replied. “Like I said, he isn’t
a Witch.”

“Then where’s he coming up with this stuff?”
the same voice asked.

“Fiction,” I answered. “Horror movies.
Novels. Perhaps even any number of texts available on the subject
of Black Magick, both accurate and inaccurate. It wouldn’t surprise
me to find a little of the Spanish Inquisition mixed in as
well.”

“So,” a different voice piped in, “what
you’re sayin’ is that all this is just a ration of shit, and he’s
just a sick bastard goin’ around killing people.”

“Yes and no,” I returned. “I definitely agree
with the ‘sick bastard’ part of your comment, but his rituals
aren’t just some ‘ration of shit’ as you put it. First off, a
ritual is nothing more and nothing less than you make it. It is a
way of focusing one’s energies, and it can be something that you
make up yourself. It doesn’t have to be some pre-prescribed set of
instructions that were written by someone else.”

“Hold the phone,” another voice chimed in the
dark. “You aren’t actually suggesting that this wacko is going to
bring some beast or demon here from hell or something are you?”

“What I’m suggesting,” I told them, “is that
a ritual is used to focus one’s energies to make something
happen—like praying or the chants that monks sing. If you’re asking
if I personally believe that he’s going to invoke something, just
let me say that I think there are forces out there that are better
left alone, and we’ll leave it at that.”

I waited wordlessly while my last statement
soaked in. There were a few whispers among the group but to my
surprise, no recurrence of the earlier heckling, so I
continued.

“Now, I realize I haven’t really told you
much about the killer, and unfortunately, I’m not able to do much
more than speculate based on the existing evidence.

“First, as I said, he’s not a Witch, but he
appears to be intimately familiar with The Craft. He might have
been a member of a coven at one time or another, but if he actually
practiced, I would think it more likely that he was solitary. It’s
possible that his knowledge of Wicca was or is derived mainly from
literature available at almost any bookstore.

“Second. Because of the lack of various
components, I have reason to believe that Ariel Tanner’s murder was
done out of his need to practice his ritual. Karen Barnes’ may well
have been an actual performance of the sacrifice. I can’t be
absolutely positive about that because as I told you, he’s making
up his own ritual here. The basic components of it tell me
generally what he’s trying to do, but so far, he’s left nothing
behind that points me to anything specific. Based on what was done
to Karen Barnes, my guess would be that it was the real thing for
him, but I don’t believe he’s finished. Until he at least perceives
that he has conjured whatever or whomever he seeks, then he will
continue to execute the ritual.

“Point three. As depicted in this image, the
skin was removed from the victim with notable precision considering
we believe that the instrument used to accomplish the task is
what’s know as a dirk. For those of you unfamiliar with the name,
it is a double-edge, European dagger that is about six inches long.
Ariel Tanner owned one for use in Wiccan rituals. It was missing
from her apartment. Someone able to do this probably has some
experience at it and has more than likely skinned an animal or
two.”

I could hear scribbling in the dark. I may
not have reached all of them, but at least some of them were taking
notes, and that bolstered my confidence almost immediately.

“Finally. This individual is meticulous about
his rituals. The flaying, the inscription, the use of a
purification incense. He took his time and made sure he followed a
regimen he had set for himself. This is going to indicate someone
deeply involved in ritual and ceremony.

“In both instances, he made it a point to
prop open the door to the house or building where he committed the
murder. This may indicate that he wants the bodies found as quickly
as possible. Couple that with the Expiation spell, and I would
theorize that he wants to be caught and punished. He is seeking not
only atonement from himself but from the world as well.”

“If the asshole wants to get caught, why
doesn’t he just turn himself in?” came another query.

“My guess would be that he would consider
that too easy,” I replied. “I don’t know. Like I said before, I’m
not a psychologist, I’m just here to interpret the symbols and
ritual for you. The rest is pure speculation. Lights please...”