Read Online The Unnaturalists by Tiffany Trent - Free Book Online Page A

of his clan.
    Syrus found the low mound by memory rather than sight. It rose like a giant, bracken-covered turtle shell through the trees. He knew he’d arrived by the smell—the odor of carrion and cat piss was strong. He thought he heard the Guard slow, as if he too had caught the scent and had suddenly become unsure. Faint ticking issued from the mouth of the mound.
    Syrus swung up into a tree, climbing as fast as he could before the Guard fully entered the clearing. Two swift, sharp sounds— tink, tank —and the Guard was on his knees. Spines in his feathered neck and the shoulder joint of his armor glinted with their own deadly light.
    Then, the great maned head emerged and before the Guard could shriek, he disappeared into the Manticore’s maw.
    Syrus clutched the tree, gasping. A sharp breeze rattled the dry leaves. He looked down, and a face peered up at him through the trees—a wide, razor-toothed face that was all the more horrible for its very human grin.
    And all along there was that ticking, as of a muffled clock. Or a faintly beating heart.
    Thank you, the Manticore said. I was quite hungry . Her voice was liquid silver, exquisite as the Harpy’s.
    “You’re . . . you’re welcome,” Syrus stuttered.
    You may come down now, boy, the Manticore said. Fierce red energy pulsed around her. Her power scorched his feet and he wondered that the tree didn’t shrivel into ashes.
    He clutched the trunk tight and said, “You . . . uh . . . sure you’re full? ’Cause there’s plenty more where that one came from in the trainyard, and I wouldn’t mind you having your fill of them.”
    The Manticore chuckled. I will not eat you, if that is what you fear.
    “Well, let’s just say I want to make certain you don’t change your mind. I’m sure I’m a mite more tasty than one of them old Guards.”
    That is most likely true, the Manticore conceded. The creature sat on her haunches, the shadow of her barbed tail curving around her paws. Still, you are far less edible because you are much more interesting .
    “Eh?”
    I take it there has been a Cull, the Manticore said.
    Syrus nodded, then realized the Manticore mightn’t be able to see him. “Yes,” he said. He began his descent, picking and choosing until he came to the last branch just a few feet from the Manticore’s smiling jaws.
    “All my family were taken or killed,” Syrus said.
    The Manticore’s eyes were like two small moons as she looked up at him. All my family have been taken or killed, too.
    Syrus remembered another old tale Granny used to tell—about Lord Virulen killing the Manticore’s child long ago on a Hunt. Anger flared like white-hot lightning. “Then why don’t you do something about it?” he shouted. The rational part of him realized he had just sassed the Manticore and that she could kill him with a well-placed barb from her tail if she chose. He shrank against the trunk again.
    Instead, she laughed, as if she read his mind. You may as well come down.
    He considered, figured there was nothing left to lose, andslithered down to land square on his bum in front of her giant paws.
    He had never been this close to her before; he had only seen her at a rare distance whenever the clans made their offerings at the edge of her clearing. He looked up at her in awe. Red light pulsed around her heart. But it was no ordinary heart. Cross-hatched with wires and hoses and gears, it sang out its rhythm like a clock. Something was scrawled on it in the old language that Granny had taught him; the characters read: ENDURANCE .
    I have done nothing because I thought there was nothing I could do, the Manticore said. But perhaps you have shown me the beginnings of a way.
    “I have?” Syrus said.
    Bring me the young witch from the City, the Manticore said. And then we shall see what might be.
    “A witch?” Syrus scratched his head. “But aren’t all the witches dead?”
    Everyone knew all the witches had been killed right around the time