Embrace The Twilight. Maggie Shayne

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СКАЧАТЬ to better see the old woman rocking and weeping, and the young one lying so utterly still. By the light of the torch, Belinda’s slender arms and her face were as white as snow, and her eyes were open wide but already bore the unmistakable glaze of death.

      Placing a hand on Melina’s shuddering back, Sarafina said, “Come, rise up away from her. She is gone from this world now.”

      Sobbing, the woman straightened her back, lifted her head and wailed in anguish as tears streamed over her weathered face. “My Belinda is dead, killed by a demon!”

      “Come.” The others were arriving now, drawn by her cries, many of them bearing torches of their own. Sarafina helped the old woman to her feet, hugged her close and looked over her quivering shoulder, down at Belinda. She had been more than a cousin. She had been a friend. Lifting her torch higher, Sarafina let her gaze skim the girl’s pale throat, until she saw what she had known she would see. Two small wounds, scarlet ribbons of blood trailing from each of them.

      Something deep inside her stirred, as if waking from a long slumber. She couldn’t take her eyes from the wounds, and involuntarily, she licked her lips.

      “It’s happened again,” a man said. It was Andre, standing near her. Katerina was right beside him, watching her sister with narrow eyes. Had she noticed Sarafina’s odd reaction to the scent of fresh blood?

      She forced herself not to look at the body again, nor at the two wounds in its throat. But the scent of the kill made her nostrils flare and her stomach clench into a hungry knot. Sickening. She detested her body for reacting this way yet again.

      And just like the other times, she could sense the creature that had done this. It was near, she realized suddenly, and she shot her glance toward the edges of the gathered group, where small children with huge, frightened eyes clung to their mothers’ skirts.

      “Get the children away from here,” she whispered, pointing at the little ones.

      The most respected man in the tribe, the Chieftain, Gervaise, looked at her, crooking a dark brow. “Sarafina?”

      “It’s here,” she told him, her voice dropping to a bare whisper. “It is still here, I tell you. Gervaise, get the children away.”

      There was no hesitation. Gervaise gave a nod, and nearly everyone obeyed, turning to hurry back toward camp, all of them gathering the children close as they went. Several of the young men remained, including Andre. Katerina stayed, as well.

      “Set guards around the camp,” Gervaise said to the young men who stood awaiting his word. “Put others to work building the coffin. Two of you, go fetch weapons and come back here. This spot shall be guarded until dawn.” The men rushed off to obey.

      “How did you know?” Katerina whispered.

      Sarafina trembled at the tone of her sister’s voice. She had noticed. She’d noticed Sarafina being the first to arrive, and she’d noticed her reaction to the sight of the demon’s kill-neither one for the first time. “How did you not know?” Sarafina asked her. “You’re supposed to be a seer, like me.”

      “Unlike you, I have no bond to demons.”

      “Do not accuse me, sister. You know nothing of this.”

      “It’s the same as the other times,” Andre said, rising slowly from Belinda’s body. He’d examined the wounds, all without touching the corpse. Then he glanced at the weeping old mother. “I am so very sorry, Melina.”

      “The demon has found us again. We must bury her quickly and move on,” someone said.

      “What good will it do?” Katerina asked. “It will only pursue us, find us again, just as it has ever since our tribe was cursed by the birth of my dear little sister.”

      Melina gasped, and Gervaise frowned deeply. Andre put his hand on Katerina’s shoulder. “This is not the time-”

      “You all must know it’s true! The first time this demon took one of our people was the summer Sarafina was born. I’ve studied on this, consulted the spirits. Every sign, every omen, tells me she is somehow bound to the creature that stalks us. She’s the reason it plagues us so.”

      “That’s madness!” Sarafina shouted. She looked at the faces around her, the speculation in them as they studied her.

      “You knew it was near,” Katerina said. “You always seem to know.”

      “I am a seer.”

      “It attacks only by night. You, more and more, are becoming a creature of the night yourself. Up until all hours, sleeping long into the day.” Her gaze swept the others. “You’ve all seen it.”

      Melina nodded her head in agreement. “It’s true.”

      “I sleep when I’m sleepy,” Sarafina said softly. “That does not mean I am in league with this creature.”

      Katerina looked around her, perhaps saw the doubt of her accusations in some of those faces, and shrugged. “If it isn’t you the demon follows so persistently, then I say we should put it to the test.”

      Frowning, Sarafina searched her sister’s face, her eyes, for some clue what she was up to. “Test?”

      “Leave us. Leave the tribe. Stay behind this time while the rest of us move on. If the demon follows again, even without you among us, that will be proof of your innocence.”

      Andre stepped forward, putting a protective arm around Sarafina’s shoulders. “I won’t permit it, Katerina.”

      “Nor will I,” said Gervaise. He studied Sarafina’s face, leaning heavily on his staff, his back bowed and his once jet hair long since gone to silver. “We are all frightened and aggrieved at the loss of Belinda. But turning against one another is not the answer. We must not let this evil divide us.”

      Now everyone present was nodding, including the two young men who had returned from the camp with rifles. Everyone except for Katerina.

      Gervaise fixed his stern gaze on the two sisters. “You two will prepare Belinda for burial.”

      Katerina paled visibly. Sarafina felt her own blood run cold at the prospect and blurted, “Surely you can hire a pair of gorgios- ”

      “You two will do it.”

      “With respect, Gervaise,” Katerina said, “my home and all my possessions have burned in a fire caused by my sister’s carelessness. I must see to it that I have shelter tonight.”

      Gervaise crooked a brow and rubbed his chin in thought. He truly was the wisest man in the village, but he was unused to having his commands questioned. “You, Katerina, will share your sister’s shelter and her possessions. It is high time the two of you learned the meaning of family.” Then he glanced at Belinda, and his voice softened to a mere whisper. “Do neither of you understand the role you play? Your mother is dead, and, since last summer, your grandmother, too. You are the seers. And you are the Shuvani. ”

      Melina shook her head. “I said from the start, they are too young to be the tribe’s wise women.”

      “They are all we have.” Gervaise patted her gently before refocusing СКАЧАТЬ