Black Moon Sing (The Turquoise Path Book 1) by L. M. Hawke Read Free Book Online Page A

moment longer, then he took a few dragging steps toward her. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s just that I’ve never seen anybody do that before. It’s a little… unsettling.”
    “Well, it’s perfectly normal if you’re a Changer. But this is why we keep everything hidden from you Typicals. You never react well to magic when you actually see it being used.”
    “Why do you…” Hosteen paused, then gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Never mind.”
    “What?”
    “Why do you still have your clothes on?”
    Ellery blushed. “What, do you think I ought to be naked right now?” The thought made her feel a little hysterical. She fought back the urge to laugh or scream.
    “No; it’s just that… you’re so much bigger than that owl was. How do your clothes stay on your human body while you’re not here ?”
    “I’ll explain it all later.” What little I know about it . “Right now I think you need to see this.”
    Hosteen held out his hand; Ellery dropped the bead into his palm. He held it up between finger and thumb, examining it closely under the shadowed brim of his hat.
    “Do you think this could have been one of Mr. Roanhorse’s stolen beads?” he asked.
    “I don’t know for sure,” Ellery said. “It’s been so long since I saw him last, since I was last in his home. And even then, he kept his turquoise covered. But it does look old, doesn’t it?”
    Hosteen nodded. “Old, but not dirty. It hasn’t been lying up there on the mesa for very long.”
    “And I found it in the middle of a track—a cougar’s track.”
    Hosteen hummed deep in his throat, a thoughtful sound. He handed the bead back to Ellery; she slipped it into her pocket.
    “The cougar was running faster than any natural cougar can, I think. I’m not a big-game expert, but my owl knows a thing or two about wildlife, as you’d expect. The distance between tracks was just too great. Only a Changer can run like that.”
    Hosteen nodded. “So it was a magic-user after all.”
    “I didn’t want to believe it could be true. I didn’t want to think that one Changer could do this to another. And still, something seems… not right about this. I can’t put my finger on it, but there was something about those cougar tracks, something about this whole situation that doesn’t sit right with me. But I can’t tell what it is.”
    “Neither can I—aside from the fact that a man has been brutally murdered. But I’m gratified to know that my instincts were correct: this was a magic-based crime. Now we just need to uncover more evidence, if we can. The cougar tracks are something, and I don’t know if the bead will help at all, but—”
    Ellery cut him off abruptly. “Hold on. What do you mean, we ?”
    “You’ve been such a great help already, using your…” he gave an awkward shrug, clearly still uncomfortable with the fact of her shifting. “Your special abilities to locate the cougar tracks. I know you can be of much greater help going forward.”
    She threw up her hands in exasperation. “I can’t, Hosteen! I loved Roanhorse—I can’t tell you how much it hurts to know that he’s gone, and that he died so horribly. But it’s dangerous for me to be here. Don’t you understand that?”
    “I can protect you,” he insisted.
    A sudden, unexpected warmth surged in Ellery’s chest. She smothered it ruthlessly. Hosteen may be good-looking, but she knew almost nothing about him. What little she did know of him spelled certain danger. As a Typ, and a fellow Diné at that, he would never be comfortable with Ellery’s magic. And one man alone could never stand against a whole community convinced that Ellery was evil—a whole community ready to take her life for the crime of being a Changer.
    “You can’t protect me,” she shot back. “And anyway, I’ve got a big problem waiting for me back at home. My friend Vivi is missing. She’s a trader, too, and—”
    “A trader?” Hosteen straightened, suddenly eager. “Any