Stolen Songbird

Page 27

He stared at me, his reluctance palpable.
“I’ve a right to know, don’t you think?”
“Fine. It was in verse. They always are, but don’t ask me why, because I don’t know.”
I shrugged. “I like poems.”
“Eyes of blue and hair of fire
Are the keys to your desire.
Angel’s voice and will of steel
Shall force the dark witch to kneel.
Death to bind and bind to break
Sun and moon for all our sake.
Prince of night, daughter of day,
Bound as one the witch they’ll slay.
Same hour they their first breath drew,
On her last, the witch will rue.
Join the two named in this verse
And see the end of the curse.”
He recited the words quickly. “It isn’t very good, as far as poems go. But it is clear.”
Clear on the surface, maybe, but binding the two of us obviously wasn’t all it would take.
Tristan settled down in the chair across from me, nibbling on a fingernail. “Any ideas?” He seemed oddly nervous given that we sat alone in a library.
I brooded on it for a moment, not liking the only idea that came to mind. “I think we need to track her down and kill her.”
Tristan rubbed his hands across his eyes. “Do you think we haven’t tried?”
“I don’t know what you have or haven’t done,” I snapped, annoyed that he was fighting me on this. “No one has bothered to tell me.”
“Then let me tell you now. For years after the Fall, humanity avoided Trollus like the plague, which wasn’t surprising given the way they’d been treated. But eventually, greed drove them back.”
“Gold?” I asked.
“Always the gold. Trollus had plenty of wealth, but no food. When the first men found their way back in, do you think that is what Xavier asked them for? No. First, he sent them after her. Wealth beyond their wildest dreams if they could produce the corpse of the witch. Countless women resembling her were slaughtered, but never the right one. His people were dying of starvation, but his entire focus was on hunting her down. Only when his own larders grew lean did he turn his resources to establishing trade for food. And they called him the Savior for it.”
“If there was ever a chance of finding her, it was then. Her face was well known. But the humans were not unhappy with the results of what she had done.” He tapped the book in front of me. “This doesn’t tell the whole story – not even half of it. There are things we did that no king would allow to be written, because that would mean they could never be forgotten.”
“Such as?”
“Such as feeding humans the flesh of their own dead while troll aristocracy feasted in their palaces. Sending humans like rats into the labyrinth with promises of riches if they found a way out. Slaughtering human babies and using their mothers like milk cows for troll infants. And once the humans had all fled, doing the same to half-blood women.”
I held up a hand to make him stop, his words making me feel breathless and unwell. What he was telling me was shocking, but looking at the expressions of the kings above us, I could well imagine them giving the orders.
“But human memories are short, it seems,” Tristan continued. “They soon forgot the atrocities of Trollus, or perhaps their greed overwhelmed their fear. They agreed to continue the hunt for the promise of gold. When it became clear she would not be found through her physical description, the hunt turned on women who followed her practices.”
“The witch trials?” He had my attention now. The trials happened once a generation, at least. I’d been ten the last time a mob of men swept through the Hollow looking for women who were uncannily skilled with herbs or predicting the weather. Calling them trials wasn’t even the truth, because anyone the mob accused was burned to death.
Tristan nodded. “Hundreds of years and thousands of women slaughtered and for what? We’re still trapped like rats in this hole. She’s still alive and no doubt has a good daily chuckle about our worsening predicament. And my father continues to send men out hunting for her, when he knows that it’s useless. It is like trying to thread a needle with a battering ram. It’s a waste of time.”
“It isn’t a waste of time,” I argued. “Your aunt told me the prophecies always come true.”
The anxiety in him rose to a fevered pitch. “I want you to drop this, Cécile. I don’t want you to spend another second thinking about it.”
“What is wrong with you?” I demanded.
“Leave it,” he shouted, jumping to his feet. “Do not pursue this any further!”
I realized then that he had duped me. “It isn’t that you don’t think the curse can be broken,” I said, snatching hold of his arm. “It’s that you don’t want it broken at all. Not even once you are king. Not ever.”
“And if you had any sense, you’d be thankful for it!” He jerked away from me hard enough that I almost fell off the chair.
“Perhaps I would be if you’d give me half the chance,” I said, rubbing my strained fingers. “But it’s difficult given you seem intent on deceiving me. Why not try the truth for once. If you’re even capable of it.”
He flinched and was quiet for a moment before speaking. “Cécile, consider this: my ancestors did not just rule Trollus, they ruled all of the Isle of Light and much of the western half of the continent. Do you honestly believe if we are set free that my people will settle for anything less?”
“I don’t think what happened in the past dictates what will happen in the future,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be that way.”
“I don’t agree,” Tristan said coldly. “And I think if you knew more about what you speak, you would be singing a different tune.”
He gestured at the table and three books toppled sideways off my stack, revealing a huge tome underneath. “Some light reading on our prior conquests.” Then he turned and walked out.
Reluctantly, I opened the book and shone my light stick on the page so I could read. Before long, I wished I hadn’t. For the centuries prior to the Fall, the trolls had been a conquering force like no other in the world. They had ruled lands that reached far beyond the shores of the Isle. Foreign nations had either bent a knee and paid tribute in slaves and goods, or their people were slaughtered. A lone troll had the power to wipe out hundreds of men, and the troll kings had armies in the thousands. The artists illustrated the history in graphic detail. My stomach turned at the sight of it.
Was this what I should expect if I set the trolls free? King Thibault’s army might be a mere echo of the trolls’ strength in prior days, but what could armies of men do in the face of a magic with the strength to blast rock and tear metal asunder? The Regent of Trianon would not willingly give up power – he would ride against the trolls and learn his lesson the hard way. And I did not see Thibault showing any mercy against an enemy army – an army that included my very own brother. I swallowed hard at the images running through my head.
But what about after Tristan was king? Then it would be within his power to ensure peace. He wasn’t like his father or like those other kings. And what’s more, with only a few exceptions, the trolls I knew were not evil marauders intent on domination. The half-bloods were fighting against oppression, and I knew there were full-bloods who were like-minded. The past did not have to repeat itself.
Rising, I smoothed out the wrinkles in my skirt, and the grimoire caught my attention. I stared at it, thinking. For all the trolls’ magic and strength, it had been a human who broke the mountain and trapped Trollus for eternity, or at least near enough to it. Humans had magic too, at least some of us. I’d be a fool to not learn what I could about it.
I picked up the book, hating the feel of the strange leather cover. “What answers do you hold?” I whispered, examining the strange lettering on the cover. Probably the language of the north, where the witch had come from. It was all gibberish to me.
I examined the clasp again, but there was no catch or release trigger that I could see. I tugged on it, but the clasp wouldn’t budge. “Stones and sky!” I swore. “Open!” I pulled hard and my hand slipped, the catch slicing painfully across my finger.
Click.
The book fell out of my hands and landed with a thud on the table, pages open. I quickly looked over my shoulder to ensure I was alone, then shone my light on the pages. The language looked the same as that on the cover, written in a tiny but neat hand. The open pages were thick with words and little drawings, but I understood none of it. Tentatively, I reached down to flip the page.
Dizziness washed through me and I closed my eyes, focused on keeping the contents of my stomach where they were. When I opened them again, I gasped aloud. The words were as clear to me as if they were my native tongue.
“Love potion,” I read aloud. The ingredients were plants and herbs that I’d never heard of – the only thing that was familiar was stallion’s urine. Three drops of the potion were to be served in red wine to the man in question, and it would be at its most potent at the stroke of midnight. “Yuck.” I flipped to the previous page: “Infliction of Boils.” Vile. I turned the pages, and my disappointment grew. The spells were petty and trivial – the sorts of things a silly village girl would use to improve her fortune or embarrass her enemies. There was nothing as grand as how to break a mountain, curse a troll, or live forever. The only spell that looked useful was one for healing, but judging from the lack of wear on that page, healing arts were not where Anushka’s interests had lain.
The spells started to grow darker. I read page after page of recipes that weren’t spells at all, but poisons designed to inflict great pain and even death. There were many that would end a pregnancy – of the witch herself or of her chosen victim. It was here that she began to use sacrifices in the rituals. Chickens, sheep, cattle – it seemed the more difficult and ugly the spell the greater the sacrifice required.
Trolls.
My eyes took in the chapter heading, and then a hand closed on my shoulder.
CHAPTER 20
CéCILE
“Find anything interesting?”
Twisting in my chair, I looked up at Élise. She didn’t seem to recognize the grimoire for what it was. “It’s all very interesting,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. The last thing I needed was the trolls finding out I’d opened Anushka’s diary – with my luck, they’d take it away before I got the chance to finish reading it. “None of it was very helpful, though.”
“Oh.” Her shoulders slumped, and I felt instantly guilty. She and all the other half-bloods were relying on me, and so far I had done nothing to prove my worth. But at least I was trying, which was more than I could say for Tristan, their leader. There was no way they knew his true feelings about breaking the curse – they’d have turned on him in an instant if they did. And I had no intention of letting that happen.
“If the answers lay in books, I’m sure scholars would have found them by now,” I said gently. “But at least I know what… happened, now.”
Élise nodded. “We should go back – you are supposed to be dining with the King this evening.”
I made a face. “Watching him dine, you mean.”
Élise giggled and then clapped a hand over her mouth. “You’re fearless in the things you say, sometimes.”
I shrugged. “Foolish is probably a better word. But you’re right, we should go.”
As she turned, I shoved Anushka’s grimoire into the deep pocket of my dress. “What did you get up to while I was reading?”
A faint smile touched the corner of the girl’s lips. “Once he was finished helping you, Martin, the librarian, that is, he showed me how they keep track of all the books.”
Which sounded terribly boring to me, but I kept my mouth shut as I watched her trail a finger longingly along the spines of books on the shelves.
“Can half-bloods work in the library?” I asked.
“If by work, you mean clean the floors,” she said, looking at me out of the corner of her eye. I gave a slight nod of understanding, but in truth, my thoughts were all for the book burning a hole in my pocket. All I could think of was the grimoire and how for five centuries it had refused to open, only to release its clasp at the touch of my blood. And of that tantalizing chapter title: Trolls.
I walked through the streets of Trollus as quickly as I could without attracting notice. Not once did I even bother to glance up at the moon hole to assuage my sense of endless night like I usually did. When we made it back to my rooms, I made a beeline to the garderobe. It was the only place I was certain I could look at the book without worrying about someone walking in on me.
Sitting down on the seat, I pulled the book out of my pocket and, nipping at my fingertip, I allowed a drop of blood to fall on the clasp. It clicked open. I flipped to the page where I left off.
It was all blood magic. In tiny letters in one of the margins, I read why: The earth holds no power over these creatures who are not her children. No illness, infection, or poison can harm them. Nor would the blood of animals or even of a human suffice; only troll blood, sometimes a little and sometimes a lot. I wondered how she would obtain their blood. Certainly they would not volunteer it for anything that might be used against them. Then it occurred to me that perhaps she wasn’t performing these spells for herself, but rather for other trolls.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to remember what I knew about Anushka herself. She’d been a courtesan. In other words, a high-priced prostitute. There was a spell for muting the connection between two bonded trolls – the advantages of that for someone in her line of work were clear enough: it would allow a troll to be unfaithful to his spouse without her suspecting. Other spells were for deception, delving into another’s thoughts, influencing moods. The worst were for murder: the easiest method for killing a troll is to separate him from his magic... accomplished with a pint of troll blood mixed with iron. When the mixture was thrown on another troll, he was blocked from his magic until the mixture was washed off. Strike immediately, Anushka advised. Their physical strength is formidable and they are exceedingly swift. The loss of their magic will provide only a moment of distraction.