Chapter 88: Orientation Over
Night fell by the time they finished with the other houses. All different cases with eerie similarities between them, mainly the victims being widowed women who suffered from terrible losses in recent years. Vulnerable souls who sought a final nudge to do something forbidden.
Mas and Garran’s report was more or less the same when they met back up in the company office. They searched the houses and found clear signs that the women were involved in dark rituals related to the Mother of Venerable Fates.
“Doesn’t make much sense, though,” Garran commented. Sitting across the shared room were all Templars, with Percival handing them hand-written reports about his findings on the book Jack used to allure the women. “They all performed different rituals, but there’s no link between them.”
“We have to find that link,” Captain Edric said, gazing intensely at the sheets in his hand. He arched an eyebrow just then. “So the book was a replica?”
“Indeed, and not a good one,” Percival muttered. “The Warden’s Scribes have told me that the second half of the book was empty, while the first half consisted mostly of rituals gathered from here and there. Looks like whoever gave that book to Jack knew about the Wretched Mother’s The Scarlet Rite. But, it seems these cases don’t have a cohesive relation between them other than that they are all tied to the Wretched Mother in one way or another.”
“That’s cohesive enough, no?” Valens asked, reached, and pulled another file in which there was information on all the victims with photos of them taken in recent years. “Brackley and the Weeping Horror were matters related to the Mother of Venerable Fates, too. That can’t be a coincidence.”
“It’s not,” Captain Edric said with one hand propped under his chin. “But I can’t see the connection here. Sacrificing people is one thing, but these women have been killed in cold blood, and there’s no sign that they have been successful at completing these rituals. Garran, did you see anything?”
“We have a certain Miss Pearl who took her chances with the ritual of womb like the one you had, but there’s no sign of the Hemling.”
“What about the scissors?” Valens asked and crossed eyes with the captain before he continued, “We couldn’t find it in Miss Martha’s house.”
“The scissors were there,” Garran shook his head. “All nine objects used in the ritual were there. Nothing was missing.”
Valens frowned. That didn’t make much sense, as Garran put it. Back in the Empire, he had a few chances to help the Inquisition and the police, but in all those cases, there were people they could use to track the clues or something solid to work with. Here, however, there was nothing.
A suspect who didn’t remember anything, and handed a book that could be considered at best a lousy replica—a couple of murders without a connection between them. Well, there was a connection, as they were all widows, but the Captain told him on their way back that there was nothing more than widows and orphans in Belgrave.