Read Online Huntress by Malinda Lo - Free Book Online Page B

I haven’t been there recently, but as you’re headed in that direction, you might ask about it.”
    Tali said, “We will.”

    Two nights later, they lodged in a tiny village perched on the banks of the Nir, and Ento was the only subject of conversation in the village’s lone tavern. Crowded with out-of-work fishermen, the dark, low-ceilinged room smelled of river water and spirits. The locals had glanced at the six travelers when they first entered, but made no effort to lower their voices to keep their gossip private.
    “A man came through the other day,” a fisherman was saying. “He told me people are deserting the place as quick as they can.”
    Built on an old crossroads, Ento had once been home to a major marketplace. But now there was little to sell, and the town had fallen on hard times.
    “That family who was here last week said the same thing,” said another man.
    “I hope whatever’s happened in Ento doesn’t move south to us.”
    “Not likely to be so lucky,” said one man bitterly. “Wind blows south from the Great Wood—we’re right in the line of it.”
    Tali turned in his seat and said casually, “We’re headed in that direction. What happened?”
    Taisin kept her eyes down, but she was curious, too. The more they heard about Ento, the more she was convinced there was something there that she should see. Her instincts were tugging on her in a way she had never experienced before. She turned slightly toward Tali, hoping he would ask the right questions. Earlier in the day, he had told them he would find out as much as he could about what was going on in Ento, and Taisin twitched with impatience.
    The fishermen all swiveled around to stare at Tali, and one of them—a man with a long, scraggly gray beard—said, “You’d be better off avoiding that place.”
    “Why?”
    The fishermen looked at one another uneasily before one of them spoke, his missing front tooth flashing like a dark eye. “It was little things at first—goats gone dry, wells turning bad.”
    “Same things have been happening all over the Kingdom,” said the gray-bearded man.
    “That was bad enough, but now folks are saying that the Xi are taking our children,” said the man with the missing tooth. His voice was harsh and loud, and the common room fell silent.
    Taisin glanced up in surprise; she had never heard of the Xi having much interest in human children before. Across the table, Tali just barely shook his head at her, and she swallowed her question.
    “It’s only one child, and no one knows if it’s true,” objected a man from across the room.
    “Has a child been taken or not?” Tali asked bluntly.
    The man with the missing tooth scowled. “The mother says it’s still her babe, but the father came through here just yesterday. Looked as though he’d lost everything. He said the child is a monster, and his wife has gone mad.”
    “It’s dark magic,” said the graybeard. “If you can avoid Ento, you should. Take an alternate route.”
    The room erupted with men arguing whether the town was safe to travel through. “Thank you for the information,” Tali said, his voice nearly drowned by the din.
    Taisin tried to focus on her meal, but the fisherman’s words rang in her mind. What kind of dark magic? Her pulse raced. She wanted to know.

    The rumors came more quickly as they approached Ento. The child was one of the Xi, cursed to inhabit the body of a human to atone for a crime; the child was the reincarnation of a legendary sorcerer; the child was a demon who had eaten the human child. After hearing the tale of the demon, Tali suggested, “Perhaps we should bypass Ento altogether.” They were in the stable yard of another inn in another fishing village, unpacking their gear for the night.
    “It will lengthen our journey by several days,” Pol said.
    Taisin, who had just finished feeding the horses, came around the corner of the wagon. “I think…” She hesitated as they all turned to look at