The meeting room fell silent as Ellie stepped inside dressed in a button down white blouse and a dark professional business skirt. Ellie’s expression was its normal bland smile, but her cheeks were slightly flushed and her eyes were very bright. Behind her trailed a somewhat frumpy looking woman in her early thirties, her expression frozen in an odd mix of shock and relief. 

The meeting room was one of only two enclosed rooms in the work area, the other being Ellie’s small office, the rest of the space was made up of individual workplaces separated by more or less permanent dividers in a fashion that would be familiar to views of police dramas of the 1980s. The room had a large polished table of shiny, striated wood, tiger maple in fact, and was surrounded by institutional grey upholstered chairs. At the head of the room was a large LCD monitor connected to a small laptop by an improbable nest of cables.

[b]“Thank you all for coming in so early and…”[/b] her eyes lingered on Leon for a dark moment, [b]“at such short notice.”[/b] Ellie settled the stunned looking woman into a seat at the end of the table with a gentle pressure of her hand.

[b]“This is Madaline Holt, our client,”[/b] she went on and made a quick round of introductions to the various team members, beginning with Leon, the most senior and concluding with Kennedy. Ellie wasn’t yet sure about Miss Carter yet, to have come through what she had with her sanity intact the lawyer had to be tough but there were limits, especially when people were new. Ellie favored her with a slight smile, before heading to the front of the room and taking her own seat in front of the laptop. The monitor hummed to life with a series of quick keystrokes and an image of a woman’s face appeared. The woman in the picture was clearly dead, sterile official lettering naming her Cassandra E Holt followed by a string of alphanumeric symbols. The right side of her face was deformed with a bloody wound in place of the eye socket. Madaline turned her head away with a soft sob. Ellie pursed her lips but continued on.

[b]“This is, or rather was, Cassandra Holt, Madaline's younger sister,”[/b] she explained in a professorial tone. Periodically she clicked at the laptop, cycling the photos through several more post mortem photographs. Mostly they established scale and provided close up on the gunshot wound and several minor contusions suffered during the fall.

[b]“Six days ago police responded to reports of a gunshot at a motel in Portland Maine.”[/b] The images change to show photos of a clothed Cassandra laying in a pool of blood on the floor of a motel bathroom, chipped tiles glittering in the flash of the camera. A small handgun lying slightly off to the side, a police issue notation tag declared it a 22 caliber Sig Sauer P220. 

[b]“GSR was found on her hand and the police didn’t find any other signs of a struggle,”[/b] Ellie went on, her eyes going to Madeline who was sitting up stiffly in her seat now, clearly upset but also determined. The room was silent for a moment before the woman began to speak.

[b]“Cassie would never kill herself,”[/b] Madeline said with quiet forcefulness, sweeping her gaze across the room as though daring anyone to contradict her. After a moment she continued.

[b]“She went to Maine to be with her boyfriend but it didn’t work out,” [/b]her voice held the slightest undertone of sisterly disapproval.

[b]“We talked everyday, she loved Portland, wanted to stay there even after the break up but she was having a lot of trouble finding work. A few months ago she told me she had me some people and she was very excited. After that though, I hardly heard from her. Then a few weeks ago she started calling me, talking strangely, hanging up at random. I was worried, I was going to go up and see her and then…” [/b]she trailed off and gestured at the crime scene photos, her bottom lip beginning to quiver.

[b]“As it happens,”[/b] Ellie cut in smoothly, Ms Holt is correct. Several more clicks at the keyboard produced a strange photograph, a close up of swirling reds blues and purples.

[b]“I performed a tertiary autopsy on Cassandra and I found she had the early stages of Tybalt-Koinegswald Syndrome. For those of you who are new to us, T syndrome is a neurodegenerative disease similar to CJD or Kuru. It is a side effect of the use of certain magical types geas.[/b]” 

Ellie paused and removed her gold rimmed spectacles to scan the room.

[b]“Which means either Cassandra was dabbling in some very questionable magic, or more likely, someone used magic to kill her.” [/b]



[u]Privileged Knowledge[/u]


[hider=Morgan Blackwood]
Ellie is clearly aroused when she enters the room.
[/hider]


[hider=Leon Smith]
Ellie has a quiet buzz of magical power when she enters the room.
[/hider]


[hider=Sadhbh Malone]
Although its physically possible, shooting yourself in the eye is an unusual method of suicide. It requires the gun be held at an unatural angled and most people go for the temple or the bottom of the jaw.
[/hider]




[/hider]