“This isn’t a cut and dry murder.”  Gildar folded his arms as his attention shifted from the hillside below them to his companion rummaging through a dun, canvas knapsack.

Mordrad frowned as he glanced up from angling for a snack.  “Tell me again why you’re here.”

Gildar resisted the impulse to roll his eyes.  Yes, Mordrad claimed decades of experience on these justice quests, but it wasn’t like Gildar stumbled out from under a burdock leaf only yesterday.

Instead, he smirked while returning Mordrad’s gaze.  “To offer a different perspective on our investigation.”

“Wrong.”  The older quester pulled something, fist-sized and wrapped in brown paper, from the bag.  “Our job is to determine the truth.  Your perspective doesn’t change any of that.”

As his mentor unwrapped a candied apple and then bit into it, Gildar caught himself contemplating the bulge around Mordrad’s middle.  The transmigrator consistently snacked on sweetened treats throughout the five weeks they’d been working together – and before.  Did packing extra pounds make it any harder for Mordrad to translocate himself from one area into another?

Never mind, there was the more important question concerning the trampled slope below them to address.

“Ballin had been doing business with Jed for years.”  Gildar hooked his thumbs into the pockets of the tan, leather vest worn over his light cotton shirt.  “Why would Jed suddenly decide to shoot Ballin’s son in the first place?”

Mordrad swallowed.  “You can’t trust humans.  They can lie without consequences, so in order to make it look like an accident, he shot the lad.”

“Correction, that lad accidentally shot himself.”

Mordrad’s eyes narrowed.  “I just said it wasn’t an accident.”

“Plaiton may be a child, but he didn’t shoot himself on purpose.”  Gildar arched an eyebrow as he tilted his head.

“Jed told him the pistol wasn’t loaded, much less primed and cocked.  He lied, and tricked the boy into shooting himself.”

Gildar frowned as he pursed his lips.  “Plaiton is nine years old, and that pistol was actually half-cocked when we examined it.  But he said he had an urge to look into the barrel, even as both Ballin and Jed hollered at him to stop.”

“Children do stupid things, especially if Jed told him it wasn’t loaded.”  Mordrad took another bite from the apple.  “And Jed could’ve easily pulled the hammer into the safety position, with Plaiton never noticing, before we arrived.”

The boy’s impulse to gaze into the caplock pistol and squeeze the trigger wasn’t the only detail that nibbled at Gildar’s skepticism.  It was an action that only lasted a couple of seconds, yet the lad would feel the effects for the rest of his life.

On a certain level, Plaiton was probably blaming himself for the end of his father’s life.  But the community would blame Jed, which put the human trader at risk of facing a shorter life.

“Why?  That’s an awfully elaborate plan.”  Gildar folded his arms as he leveled his gaze at Mordrad.  “Kill off one of your more lucrative trading partners by giving his son a loaded pistol, figure he’ll shoot himself and not anybody else, and know for certain Ballin will sacrifice himself to save the boy’s life.”

The transmigrator swallowed and glared back.  “Even humans comprehend parental instincts.  And that plan would be all the more elaborate for somebody besides Jed to pull off.”

Now he locked his gaze with Mordrad’s.  “Jed didn’t know Ballin was an empath.”

“Another lie.”  Mordrad shrugged, and a subtle smile curved his lips as the glare faded.  “You don’t understand humans very well, do you?”

His mentor’s change in attitude was a clear signal, meant to remind him yet again that Gildar was only an apprentice.  The elder quester’s decades of experience should trounce any analytical concerns voiced by a greenhorn.

Except Gildar had more experience with humans than Mordrad realized … but this was no time to regale someone with childhood exploits.

The transmigrator’s attitude miffed him, but he’d learned the best way to rattle his mentor’s smugness.  Gildar broke into an indulgent grin.

“I do understand humans can’t make anybody act against his will.  That’s why Plaiton might have been enchanted.”

Mordrad’s smile dropped.  His complexion reddened as his eyes bugged slightly.

“Nobody can make someone act against his will!”  The words burst out like stench from a rotten egg thrown against a rock.  “That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard!”

“Then you’d better brace yourself for what I have to say next.”  Gildar was probably enjoying Mordrad’s reaction more than he should.

“I’m not listening to this manure!”  Mordrad turned away and snapped into the apple.

“Plaiton acted on an impulse he can’t explain.  If somebody has figured out a way to influence the actions of others, it’s a high priority for us to find out who it is.”

Mordrad spun back toward him and raised a hand, shaking the half-eaten fruit.  “Have you been grazing locoweed?  Jed met with Ballin to ostensibly barter goods, caused Plaiton to shoot himself in the face, and Ballin died from bearing his son’s wound onto himself.  Case closed!”

“And what was Jed’s motive?”

“Prejudice, pure and simple.”

Gildar arched an eyebrow.  “Against an associate he’s traded with for years?”

“It’s a fact you can’t trust humans.”  Mordrad chomped another bite, and then hurled the core into a nearby patch of the forest that haphazardly carpeted the hillsides.

Gildar muttered, “Your aim is decidedly off.”

The transmigrator glared again.  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m standing right here.”  He appreciated phrases with double meanings.

“Don’t give me any good ideas.”  Mordrad shoved the crumpled paper into a side pocket of his knapsack before shouldering the bundle.  “We’ll report our findings to the magistracy, and leave Jed to the fate he made for himself.”

Except Jed might not have earned that fate.  And why did the boy shoot himself?

Gildar’s attention returned to the slope below them.  The shin-high grass, trampled where the ground leveled off, betrayed where Jed had halted his wagon to meet with Ballin and Plaiton earlier today.  It was also evidence how Gildar and Mordrad investigated the murder site after they were notified of what happened.

After speaking with Jed and Plaiton, the questers then allowed the trader to leave with his wagon of wares, while they returned the boy and his father’s body to the family home.

“I’m going to examine the scene again.”  His gaze remained on the disturbed site.

“I’d say you’re wasting your time, except you could use the practice.”  Mordrad squinted.  “But as soon as you’re done, change into a booby or cuckoo or whatever tickles your fancy, and meet me back at the tribune.”

Gildar nodded.  “Right.  When I’m done.”

The older man stared at him for a few seconds, muttered something Gildar couldn’t catch, and flicked his right wrist.  With a subdued pop, he vanished from sight.

Gildar shrugged off his own knapsack and held it in one hand.  “But not before I’m done.”

He descended the slope, and dropped the pack to the ground when he neared the grass still leaning to one side from being rolled on by wagon wheels.  Upon raising his hands to his chest and pressing the palms together, a tan mist swirled around him for an instant.

When it evaporated, he stood on all fours like any proper hound dog and thrust his muzzle into the supple blades.

Although his sense of smell could never match that of a real hound, it was still improved over what his nose could pick up in natural form.  Gildar crept between the parallel tracks and picked up the odor of horse … of course.

He moseyed closer to where the wagon had stopped, and before reaching the precise location picked up his own scent, as recognizable as that of the equine.  Hmm, hopefully that wasn’t an incrimination of his personal hygiene….

The smell of a second person near his own trail had to be Mordrad.  Except for aromas that uniquely stood out or he was well acquainted with, Gildar couldn’t always identify to whom an odor belonged.

But he did recognize different scents.  The smell of a third person was likely Jed, since it was near his and Mordrad’s trails.  Gildar crept closer to where the wagon had stood.

There was no mistaking the essence of blood.  He hesitated over it, allowing its complexities to permeate his olfactory glands so he could confirm the fourth person.  This was where Ballin had fallen, giving his life in exchange for his son’s, transferring the wound that would have killed the boy to himself.

A slight chill rippled through Gildar.  What parent who had ever lost a child wouldn’t have yearned to perform the same act as Ballin?  Gildar wasn’t married yet, although he did have a sweetheart … and the prospect of family in the future made the weight of this morning’s event even heavier.

He crept toward another patch of blood a couple of paces from the first.  After pondering the complexities, he confirmed this was where Plaiton, the fifth person, had fallen, but then was rescued by his father before the bullet actually killed him.

Ballin would’ve had to act swiftly, with no hesitation.  And that was exactly what he did.

Gildar reached where the wagon had stood.  Everybody was accounted for, but maybe he could pick up the aroma of something they’d missed, perhaps not where it was supposed to be.

Wait – what was that?

He questioned himself at first, considering the possibility that he’d lost the tally of everything he’d been tracking.  This odor shouldn’t be here … had he forgotten an important detail from either Jed’s or Plaiton’s testimony?

“Teeny biting fleas!”  Perhaps it was because his thoughts had wandered into a somber arena that the discovery unsettled him, spurring the hackles on the back of his neck to spring up.

Why had he picked up the scent of a sixth person?

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Here is my contribution to this month’s #BlogBattle, and the word this round is Sacrifice. You probably figured out this is the first part to a longer short story, so here we go again….

Be sure to check out the other stories that have been submitted!