Free Huntress by Malinda Lo Page B

warned her.
    “We are not here to take him,” Taisin reassured her.
    “What can you do? You’re only a girl.”
    For a moment Taisin wavered. What exactly was she planning to do, anyway? The baby cried again, and the sound of it jerked at her gut. She forced down her self-doubt and said: “I am training to be a sage. Please—I’ve come a long way, and I want to help you.”
    The woman eyed the two girls on her doorstep. They were both young and obviously inexperienced. The girl who had spoken was so eager to prove herself, while her silent companion seemed reluctant to be there at all. These days, the woman was suspicious of almost everyone who came to her door, but these two girls, with their artless faces, made her feel hopeful for the first time in weeks. Perhaps this girl really was a sage in training, but even if she was lying, what harm could a couple of girls do? She stepped back and allowed them to come inside.
    The house, consisting of one room, was small but clean. A fire burned on the stone hearth, and nearby was a rocking chair and a cradle. There was a platform bed against the far wall, its blankets mussed as though someone had slept there recently. A little shrine was built into the corner; Taisin saw the scroll listing ancestors’ names, a spray of dried flowers, a small pot of incense. It did not look like the house of a madwoman.
    “When was your baby born?” Taisin asked.
    “Three months ago.” The woman’s eyes darted toward Kaede, who said nothing. “He is healthy,” she insisted.
    “Where is your husband?” Taisin asked.
    Tears filled the woman’s eyes, and she began to rub her left arm nervously, as if it were a lucky stone. “He has gone,” she answered, and her voice broke. “He has gone.”
    “Why?” Taisin asked.
    “He—he believes I have betrayed him.” She rubbed her arm more quickly.
    “Why would he think that?”
    “He says the baby is not his.” As she spoke, the baby opened his mouth and wailed. She knelt down and picked him up, rocking him in her arms until he quieted. “But I never betrayed my husband. I was with him every night. This is our baby.” Tears trickled out of her eyes, leaving shining rivulets on her cheeks.
    Taisin walked to the woman and put her hand on the baby’s blanket. “Let me see him.”
    At first the woman clutched her baby closer, but as Taisin waited calmly, she slowly relaxed and allowed Taisin to pull back the blanket. The child looked perfectly normal: a sleeping baby boy, fine new hair in a black cap over his head, a small nose, a bow of a mouth.
    Kaede approached them, unease rising in her. The mother’s eyes were skipping about the room, looking everywhere but at Taisin or her son. The boy let out a small coo as he awoke, reaching for Taisin’s hand. He wrapped his little fingers around her thumb and tugged. Taisin’s eyes widened; a shudder went through her.
    “What is it?” Kaede asked. This did not feel right.
    “How wondrous,” Taisin breathed. The baby’s eyes were black as coal, without a glint of light in them. They were unnatural.
    “Taisin,” Kaede said warningly. She could see the boy’s eyes now, and a knot of horror clenched in her belly. No human had eyes like that.
    “It’s all right,” Taisin said, but Kaede didn’t know if she was talking to the baby, his mother, or herself. Taisin seemed entranced by him.
    He let go of her thumb and reached up with chubby fists, trying to grab the strands of Taisin’s hair that had come loose from her braids. She leaned closer, and the medallion that Sister Ailan had entrusted her with tumbled out over the collar of her tunic, as if it had been pulled. It was shiny and bright, and the stone was like a magnet to the child’s hands. When he touched it, he and his mother and Taisin shone for an instant as long as one blink—and then Taisin was clutching at the child’s fists, which were firmly clasped around the medallion.
    “Let go,” Taisin hissed, and the child