Marcii (The Dreadhunt Trilogy Book 1) by Ross Turner Read Free Book Online

another mutilated carcass.
    And Midnight.
    “Oh my God…” Marcii breathed in horror, though her words reached no further than her own ears.
    The deaf, dumb old man was sat amidst the carnage, covered from head to toe in blood and ragged flesh and discarded organs, unable to move, for an almost unrecognisable human carcass was sprawled across him.
    Marcii was frozen still in horror.
    “Midnight…” She whispered.
    The pit in her stomach was deep and cavernous and filled with dread.
    He looked up, but he did not speak.
    He trembled visibly. His eyes were wide and clearly had seen far too much.
    For some reason then Marcii looked down, just as the crowds began to assemble and swarm behind her, eyeing her warily and suspiciously, for they presumed that somehow, impossibly, she had known he was in there.
    At her feet, upon the wooden floor of the shed, traced in the torrents of blood that lined the floorboards, were the markings of claws upon the timber, deep and thick. The claw marks were interspersed with the footprints of some kind of animal, though Marcii had never seen prints so large in all her life.
    But then, within seconds, as the huge bulk of the town blacksmith surged past Marcii, startling her in the process, all evidence of the footprints was erased as his enormous boots smeared the blood afresh.
    He tossed the carcass negligently to one side as if it weighed nothing and scooped the poor old man, trembling and dithering, up into his strong arms.
    Midnight caught Marcii’s gaze as the blacksmith carried him away and the look in his eyes was beyond haunted.
    Soon enough, when he was out of sight, Marcii’s eyes fell yet again upon the crowds that surrounded her, keeping their distance, eyeing her with evermore caution.
    It seemed, and perhaps irreversibly so now, that their distrust in Marcii was greater than it ever had been.
    That spelled relentless trouble for the young girl, even if she did not yet know it.

Chapter Eight
     
     
                  Marcii was still shaken and the longer she spent out on the streets the more and more people avoided her. Avoidance now however was not simply a case of others walking around her. Instead, wherever the young Dougherty went, as soon as she appeared, the entire street cleared almost instantly, leaving her stood alone and deserted.
                  Had she had her way, Marcii would have returned home and stayed there. But, as was always the case it seemed, she had been forced out by her demanding mother, and sent on another bout of errands.
                  This time it was not the market though, thankfully. Marcii didn’t know if she would have been able to take that.
                  No, this time her mother needed herbs and spices, and whilst there were merchants in the square who sold such items, their prices were always too steep, and their family had little money for such luxuries.
                  And so, as she regularly did, every few weeks or so, Marcii was on her way to visit Malorie.
                  The walk was not far: not even half the distance to the other side of town where she often stole away to meet Kaylm. Nonetheless, the journey felt as though it lasted a lifetime. There were eyes upon her from every corner of every street, and even when all around her the streets were emptied in avoidance, Marcii somehow still felt them watching her.
                  She was more than a little relieved to finally see Malorie’s odd little cottage appear before her.
                  It’s not that there was anything wrong with Malorie’s home, Marcii thought as she approached. But rather, like Malorie herself in fact, there was just something different about it: something unique that Marcii had never quite been able to place.
                  It was a squat little house built from rugged stone blocks that seemed to be forever crumbling away here and there. There