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Sighing, he eyed Alexander. The reaper was dressed appropriately, for once—a jester’s costume was very fitting for his existence.
His brow rose a bit as he noticed that the male had a hand on Theo’s back—interesting. Alexander, as he always did, had an annoyingly bright smile on his face. Theo…looked concerningly tired.
The male cleared his throat again. “Perhaps I should take over, considering this is a dead paranormal, and I am a reaper?”
Octavius just barely held back the anger that tried to bubble up at the suggestion. Instead of screaming, he tossed his head back on a dramatichmphand said haughtily, “My house, my case.”
Turney sighed next to him. The zombie sounded exasperated. He wasn’t sure why. It was Octavius who should be exasperated! It was his party that had been interrupted! Well, at least everyone would be talking about this one for years. Like, how many Halloween parties could tout having an actual dead body show up? Maybe this was a good thing? Perhaps, this would become the greatest party of all time! One for the record books! Yes, this was a good thing. He could spin this.
“Um…Octavius?” Turney prodded.
He blinked and then eyed the zombie. “What?”
“You zoned out.”
“No…I don’t think I did,” he drawled innocently. Even though he so totally had.
His gaze flicked back to the reaper. Alexander’s smile got stupidly brighter.
“Octavius,” the reaper started coaxingly. “Surely, I could be of help?”
Octavius pursed his lips and eyed him narrowly. If Alexander wanted to, the reaper could take over and kick them off the investigation. So, an offer to help was, he supposed, better than letting him take over.
Fine, Octavius would compromise. He could do that. Compromising was the easiest and least annoying option.
“I suppose, if you wish to help, you may. But only help. Let’s be clear, this is my investigation.”
The reaper nodded. “Yes, I understand. I’ll only help. You are in charge.”
“Yes, well…” He drew in a deep breath and let it out. Glancing around, he smiled when he found the room was now clear. Clear meant the candy bowl was now completely unobscured. He eyed it. It would be so easy to just walk over and take a piece. Turney would likely try to stop him. But if he flew away… No! He’d be good. He’d stay away from the candy.
“Uh…Octavius?” Turney nudged him.
He blinked… Right, he’d been in the middle of saying something…what had it been? “Oh! Yes.” Octavius cleared his throat and glanced at Alexander. “If you must help, then feel free to examine the body and tell us what you find.” He waved towards the dead body.
Alexander, with a smile still on his face, pulled away from Theo and walked over to crouch down near the body. The naga’s head was cracked open, probably from the fall… The question was, had he been dead before he fell? And if he hadn’t, how had such a fall killed him? It wasn’t as if he was human. His reflexes should have been enough for him to jump free of the falling chandelier. And if he’d been impaired in some way…well, the current crack in his skull wasn’t really enough to kill a creature such as him. Nagas…were a pain in the ass to kill.
Alexander checked each limb, which was pretty easy to do due to the sparse costume. Then again, the performer’s role had been to use his naga abilities to frighten the crowd. It was hard to do that when restricted by a full body costume.
“No defensive wounds, or noticeable injury, besides the head,” Alexander murmured, before lifting up the male’s eyelids. The smile on his face instantly became tense. “The veins in his eyes have turned violet.”
“Murdered then,” Octavius said with a frustrated huff.
Just his luck that some asshole ended up poisoned at his party…like, the nerve!
A thought occurred to him as Alexander moved to check other parts of the dead naga. Pulling out his phone, Octavius flipped it open and tapped on a writing app. He titled a new documentMurder Mystery at the Scarlett Estate. Quickly, he typed up what had happened, and what Alexander had said about the body.
The reaper opened the paranormal’s mouth wider, leaning forward to sniff. “Smells like cardeum.”
“That would certainly do it,” he drawled with a bored sigh, before adding it to his notes.
Alexander stood up. “No other injuries, besides the one which was caused by the fall. I will say, I smelled death when I first entered the ballroom. So, he was dead before the fall. But he is still warm enough for his blood to run, so he didn’t die too long ago.”
“So…someone poisoned him, but it took a moment to work?” Turney asked.
Alexander shrugged. “It’s a slow acting poison until it actually hits.”
“What he means by that is, the man probably felt perfectly fine and normal up until the very moment he died. This particular poison will spread through one’s body without notice until it has fully contaminated every organ. And then it will shut your system down. To note, this was probably not a random target. Cardeum is a rare and strange choice poison-wise. It is perfectly harmless to the undead, humans, and a good number of other paranormals. But, for reptilian type creatures, like the victim, it is fatal.”
