Mini-excerpt: The Light Who Shines: Chapter 01. Double Depravity: Part 02

Senior Detective Tony Gambino, who stands on the sidewalk next to the street where the body was found, is spilling over with anger and determination. I can feel so many emotions at a murder scene where the angst runs high. However, the job at hand requires that I focus on the victim’s emotions.
 
“Gambino, can you give me a minute? I have some questions, but I need to take some time here first.” Why can’t someone hanging around here just feel guilty? My job would be so much easier.
 
Gambino nods his assent, and I admire how despite his abundant emotion he looks the epitome of calm concentration.
 
I circle the taped off crime scene, stopping here and there, closing my eyes, feeling with my sixth sense for lingering signs of magic or strong emotion. A biting breeze blows by, sending a chill up my spine. The air, independent of the breeze, is awash with emotion. Coming directly from where the body had lain, a strong, sharp pulse of pain mixed with duller threads of anguish hits me. My pulse escalates and my heart stammers as the pain and torment submerge me. I seek solace in slow, deep breaths, reminding myself that this pain doesn’t belong to me.
 
Another emotion tickles my consciousness a few steps from the body. It’s a small sliver of emotion, which indicates that it only lasted a small moment of time, but it’s intense. Confusion? No—it’s surprise. I walk into the cloud of surprise only to be hit by another emotion. My feet are positioned exactly where the shards of glass were scattered when it hits me. The fine hairs on the back of my neck rise as I am pummeled by a blast of shock and horror in one small space. This emotion is incongruent with the first because it comes with a different signature, a different resonance left in the air. There were definitely two parties here.
 
My feet carry me down the street a few steps and the emotions shift back to the first signature. I do not own these emotions, but I certainly enjoy them. I sense liberation and triumph! Not the usual feelings one would expect to be haunting the body of a severely tortured young man. I sense something else warring with the feelings of liberation and triumph. It’s a deep, primordial fear, the feeling of being prey. This boy was hunted or chased, or perhaps he was hiding from something terrible.
 
I stand still and further ratchet down my normal senses, turning them almost completely off so I can feel more fully with my sixth sense, searching for any hint of magic. Emotions wash over me freely. Reaching past them, I search for something deeper and more elemental.
 
Something is coming from where the boy’s body had lain. It’s nothing more than a light tingling in the air, low to the ground, but I can feel that it has great significance. Moving closer to stand outside the outline of the body, I crouch down and fan my hands through the air close to the ground. A slight buzz zips through my hands, telling me the boy had a magical gift. The magic is clear, but its purpose is vague. It’s something basic yet powerful, but the reverberations don’t speak to a specific gift. I sift my fingers through the prickly air. I can’t feel that any magic was used, but rather just that magic had been there in the boy. Damn it! It’s too elusive, and I don’t have much to go on...
 
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Excerpt from: The Light Who Shines

By: Lilo Abernathy

On Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Light-Who-Shines-Bluebell-Kildare-ebook/dp/B00HYH3ZU4/ref=tmm_kin_title_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1392572506