ARC: Stolen Songbird

  Walking to the front of the room, I silently regarded my followers. I would be their champion, lead the revolution to tear down the autocracy that valued only power and bloodlines, even if it meant starting a war against my father. I would risk my own life and those of my friends to accomplish these goals, but there was one thing I’d never do: break the curse.

  Some creatures were best kept in their cages.

  CHAPTER 13

  CéCILE

  I hadn’t heard Tristan come in during the night, but when I awoke the following morning, there was something sitting on the pillows next to me. At one end was a clear glass ball that was attached to a pommel-like handle wrapped with soft white leather. The handle had a thin leather wrist-strap hanging from the end of it. Next to it was a short note written in the flowing script I recognized as Tristan’s.

  You looked ridiculous walking around the city carrying an empty wineglass. I don’t care to be associated with a drunk. Particularly one who damages glassware. Touch the diamond with your finger to turn it on.

  TdM

  Examining the item more closely, I saw that there was a formidable diamond embedded in the handle. Tapping it with my finger, I smiled in delight as the bulb at the end lit up. Tapping the diamond again extinguished it. “Clever, clever,” I whispered, climbing out of bed and dragging the covers with me.

  The door flung open. “Good morning, Cécile!” The Queen smiled at me, but as usual, it was the Duchesse who had spoken.

  Even though my ankles were tangled in the pile of linens, I managed a passable curtsey, wondering if they intended to intrude on me every morning. “Your Majesty. Your Grace.”

  “Where is Tristan?” The tiny troll demanded. “Matilde, turn around so that I can see.”

  “He isn’t here,” I said. “But he was here,” I added when she frowned. “Briefly.” It wasn’t entirely a lie – he must have come in at some point to leave the light.

  “Briefly.” The Duchesse’s eyebrow rose.

  “He gave me this,” I said, hoping to forestall any other questions.

  The Duchesse examined the light stick and then read the note. “Ha ha!” she cackled.

  “What is it! Let me see! Is it a love note?” the Queen demanded, reaching over her shoulder.

  “I suppose some people might call it a love note.” The Duchess winked at me.

  Tristan’s mother read the note and sighed. “Oh dear. It isn’t very good, is it?”

  “It’s his first time, Matilde,” the Duchesse replied. “I’m sure he’ll improve with practice.”

  I stifled a laugh at the thought of His Royal Highness putting any effort into love notes. Especially ones addressed to me.

  The Duchesse clapped her hands together. “Now let us get down to business. Yesterday was a disaster, to say the least. I don’t want anything similar to occur at the party this evening.” She gestured for me to come closer. “How much longer do you suppose it will take your face to heal?”

  I glanced at the mirror across the room, my black eye prominent even in the dim light. “Another week,” I ventured. My gran had the knack for herbs and healing, and she’d taught a lot of it to my sister, but I’d never paid much attention. I hadn’t needed to.

  “Mercy!” The Duchesse shouted the word, making me jump. “So long? It amazes me you survive a trip to the privy, you humans are so fragile. Élise!” she hollered, rather unnecessarily, given the girl was already in the room.

  “Yes, Your Grace?”

  “Is your aunt in the city?”

  I saw the nearly imperceptible tightening around Élise’s eyes at the mention of Esmeralda. “She is, Your Grace.”

  “Go see if she has anything that might speed up the girl’s healing. I’m tired of her looking like one of those dreadful drawings my eight year-old nephew is always sending to me.”

  “He uses a lot of color, I take it,” I said, examining the virulent bruises on my arms.

  “He uses a lot of gore,” the Duchesse corrected. “Now tell me, do you know how to dance?”

  It turned out that I did not know how to dance, at least not by troll standards, and my aching toes did not let me forget it as I stood in the ballroom of Marc’s manor, watching trolls glide across the floor.

  Esmeralda had been all too truthful in her description of them. Seen like this, en masse, with only me and a handful of half-blood servants to color the mix with human blood, it was like watching a circus freak show while being locked in a madhouse. At least half of them were marked with physical deformities or were clearly not sound of mind, but power crawled through the room, making it hot. I watched them with wide eyes, half afraid and half entranced by the bizarre display.

  A prickle ran down my spine.

  “They are all here,” said a deep voice. “Even now, none of them dare test the limits of my power.”

  I stiffened before dropping into a curtsey. “Your Majesty.” The King stood beside me, arms crossed, though how he had gotten his bulk there without me noticing was a mystery.

  “They are all here to prove their support for our continued reign, but my son, my heir, is notably absent.”

  I swallowed hard, fighting the urge to run. Something about Tristan’s father filled me with dread. It was like having a shark circle you in the water, knowing it intended to strike, but not when.

  “I cannot even begin to describe what it is like to spend one’s life trapped. To be the most powerful being in this world, but reduced to ruling a dark, dank cavern. To be forced to rely on the greed of lesser creatures for sustenance. For life.” He sighed, shifting his massive bulk. “It violates the order of the universe.”

  Stones and sky! If I hadn’t been so darned terrified, I would have rolled my eyes at his arrogance. Order of the universe?

  “You’re afraid of me, aren’t you.” There was no inflection in his voice, and his eyes remained passively on the dancers.

  I was afraid of him. Horribly afraid, but somehow I managed to keep my voice level. “I know that if you hurt me, it hurts him in some fashion.” I straightened my shoulders. “And he’s the heir to your precious Montigny line.”

  A faint smile grew on the King’s face. “True. But he is not my only heir. A fact you might remind him of when you next see him.”

  A sour taste appeared in the back of my throat as I watched Tristan’s father stroll away, nodding his head at those he passed as though he had not just threatened his own son’s life. And mine. Ignoring curious glances, I hurried through the ballroom, desperate to be away from the stifling heat.

  The hallways were cool and I walked for some time looking for a way outside. The sounds of shouting and laughter reached my ears, and I followed them onto a balcony overlooking a courtyard filled with racks of weapons. Dominating the space were two enormous trolls – I judged them to be at least eight feet apiece – leaping back and forth across the yard on one foot and shouting insults at each other.

  “Those are the twins, otherwise known as the Baron and Baroness, and individually known as Vincent and Victoria.”

  I clapped a hand over my mouth to keep from squeaking in surprise and spun around. “You trolls make a fine habit of sneaking up on people,” I accused Marc, who was leaning against the building, cloak pulled up to obscure his face. “And what are you doing out here anyway? Isn’t this your party?”

  “I don’t like parties.”

  “Oh,” I said, my brow creasing as I tried to make out his face in the darkness. “Then why did you throw one?”

  “I owed someone a favor.” Marc shrugged one shoulder and came over to stand next to me. “It was not the worst thing he could have asked for.”

  I quietly wondered who he was. I had thought the party had come as a request from the Duchesse, but apparently that was not the case. And it wasn’t the King – he wouldn’t have needed to use a favor to get Marc to throw a party. Which left Tristan. But why? The point of the party was to see whether all the troll aristocrats would give their support to the
King’s decision to install me as a princess, which seemed decidedly contrary to what Tristan seemed to want. So why ask his cousin to throw a party that would speed along the process? I bit my lip, realizing with a surety that Tristan was not the passive victim of circumstance that he was playing himself off to be. What remained unknown was the nature of his end goal. As we stood watching the two giant trolls leap around the courtyard, I considered putting the question to Marc but eventually decided against it. “What are they doing?” I asked instead, gesturing to the courtyard.

  “Victoria and Vincent are continually having contests to determine which one of them is head of their household,” Marc replied. “Sprinting, rock throwing, javelin tossing, breath holding, handstands… You’ll get the picture soon enough. They’ll probably want you to judge.”

  “But Victoria’s a girl,” I protested. Although not like any girl I knew. She was dressed in a coat and trousers like her brother, and only the long braid hanging down her back and her slightly more refined features gave her away as female. “Even if she was born minutes before him, wouldn’t he still inherit his father’s title?”

  Marc started laughing. “Best you not ever mention such an idea to Vic,” he said, his shoulders shaking. “She has no time for the limitations of what she terms ‘ridiculous human ideologies’. And besides, their barony was actually passed down to them from their mother. For trolls, the child with the most formidable magic inherits – regardless of whether the troll is male or female, or who was born first.”

  “Oh,” I breathed, liking the idea very much.

  “The twins, however, are equal in all things, including magic,” Marc continued. “I expect they will be content to share their title for the rest of their lives.”

  “Sort of share,” I giggled as the two giants collided with each other, hopping wildly to keep from toppling over.

  Both trolls looked up at us.

  “Hello there, Marc!” Vincent bellowed. His eyes fixed on me and he set his foot down.

  “Disqualification!” Victoria shouted, but her brother wasn’t listening.

  He barreled over to us and fell on his knees in front of me. “My lady! You are even more beautiful up close!”

  I thanked him and let him kiss my hand, until his sister elbowed him out of the way. “Vincent, you are entirely unoriginal. I am Victoria de Gand, Baroness de Louvois, my lady.” Vincent scowled at her, but he was ignored. “Allow me to say,” she continued, “you are as lovely as a flower in bloom. Especially now that your face is less scabby.”

  “Thank you,” I said, smiling at them. “Are you by any chance the Vincent that sat on His Highness’s face when he was a child?”

  He shook with laugher. “Yes, indeed, my lady. Though I couldn’t manage the same feat now. Tristan would toss me across the city.”

  “True,” Victoria agreed. “No one out-magics Tristan, except for his Majesty. And Anaïs.” They said the last bit together with an eye roll. “She’s a looker, our Anaïs,” Vincent said. “But she’s got the personality of one of those prickly fellers. You know, the ones with the quills.”

  “Porcupines?” I guessed.

  Vincent pointed at me. “That’s the one. Personality of a porcupine.” He sighed happily. “I do love alliteration.”

  “I trust you two can manage to keep the lady entertained for the time being?” Marc asked. “I suppose I should make an appearance at my own party.”

  “Would be our pleasure,” Victoria said. “Could we interest you in a contest, my lady?”

  After eliminating such options as rock tossing and jumping to see who could touch the highest point on the wall, we settled on archery. Victoria and Vincent easily hit the bull’s-eye on the target. Mine landed right between theirs.

  “Perhaps if we back up a few paces,” I suggested. We did so, but still, all three of us easily hit the bull’s-eye.

  “There’s no sport in this,” Victoria complained.

  “I agree,” I muttered. “We need a moving target.”

  The twins looked at me with interest.

  “Not me,” I clarified.

  “That would be a bit more of a challenge,” Vincent muttered. Then his eyes brightened. “I’ll be right back.” He dashed through an open door and returned moments later carrying a moose head, horns and all. “This creature is a moose, isn’t it?”

  I examined the dusty old thing. “Perhaps a few centuries ago.”

  “’Twill do,” Vincent muttered. The moose head flew out of his hands and began to dance around the yard. I laughed, noticing that several other trolls had come out to watch our game.

  “You there, boy!” he shouted at a page. “Make this thing dance about while we shoot arrows at it. Be sure to make it erratic.”

  It didn’t take long for the contest to be modified so that we all were standing on one leg with our right eyes closed shooting arrows at a flying moose head. I was laughing so hard tears ran down my cheeks and my ribs ached beneath the tight stays of my corset. Then out of nowhere, a steel spear as thick as my arm shot through the air and pinned our moose against the wall. The three of us spun around. Tristan was brushing his hands off, looking exceedingly pleased with himself. Anaïs stood next to him in a brilliant red gown. Smiling, she rested a hand possessively on Tristan’s arm.

  I felt my temperature rise, anger and perhaps… jealousy? Surely not. What did I care about how he spent his time?

  “No one likes a show-off, Tristan,” Victoria shouted.

  The two of them strolled towards us and I became acutely aware that I was sweaty, dusty, and my hair had come loose from jumping about. “How do you know it wasn’t Anaïs?” Tristan asked, looking fondly at the beautiful girl on his arm.

  “She’d burst out of her dress if she even tried,” Victoria sniffed.

  “That a challenge?” Anaïs’s voice was sultry and low.

  Victoria pointed a finger at her. “Always.”

  We all watched as she hoisted one of the spears off the rack. “If you wouldn’t mind, Tristan.”

  He shrugged and the moose pulled away from the spear, which clattered onto the stone floor. With a surprisingly unladylike grunt, Anaïs launched her spear, pinioning it to the wall. “What do I win, Victoria? Do I get to be Baroness for the day?”

  The twins rolled their eyes as if to say I told you so. I raised a hand to get their attention and recited: “The perfectly pretty porcupine perfumed the palace with the putrescence of a porky pig.” They both fell to the ground in hysterics.

  Anaïs crossed her arms. “What is she going on about?”

  “Inside jest,” Victoria laughed, wiping tears from her face. “Had to be there.”

  She sniffed. “Perhaps you’d like to give it a go, my lady.” Picking up a spear, she tossed it my direction. I caught it, but the weight of the metal spear sent me stumbling backwards. I wasn’t strong enough to throw it more than a couple of feet much less hit a target. “It’s what we use to hunt sluag for sport,” she said. “Afraid your little arrows wouldn’t do you any good.”

  There wasn’t much I could say to that – she was right.

  “I’m surprised you use weapons against them at all,” I snapped. “Why not just use magic like you do for everything else?”

  Anaïs rolled her eyes. “Magic doesn’t work against sluag – they nullify it. I’ve killed five of them,” she boasted.

  I clapped my hands loudly, doing my best to be patronizing. “And here I thought your sole purpose was to walk around looking pretty.”

  “Jealous?” she sneered.

  “Not hardly,” I lied.

  “You’re lying – I can tell.”

  I smirked. “Jealous?”

  Her face darkened. “Unfortunate the sluag didn’t gobble you up.”

  I looked at Tristan to see how his growing irritation would manifest, but he said nothing, seemingly absorbed in polishing one of the buttons on his coat. “Why don’t you go back to the party, Cécile?” he said, flicking at an invisible
bit of lint on his coat. “I’m sure they have all manner of entertainments concocted to keep you busy.”

  “Speaking of the party,” I snapped. “Your father has taken notice of your absence and isn’t best pleased. He asked that I remind you that you are not his only heir.”

  Tristan’s finger froze in the process of flicking another bit of lint, and I felt the stab of his unease. “Did he ask you to relay any other message to me?”

  “He did not.” He hadn’t needed to.

  “Well then,” Tristan smiled a patronizing little smile. “Unless you care to speculate why he might have felt the need to remind me of my younger brother’s existence – a fact I could hardly forget – then perhaps you might consider finding your way back to the party.”

  My skin burned hot with anger. “Excuse me,” I muttered and hurried back into the house.

  The last thing I wanted was to rejoin the party, so instead I wandered through the empty corridors until I found a staircase that led to what appeared to be a basement. Holding my light up so that it shone ahead of me, I made my way down. The corridor was lined with doors, which I opened one by one. They were all filled with wine bottles and casks, but nothing else of interest. Above me, I could hear the footfalls of dancers, the faint thrum of music, and the occasional burst of laughter. They clearly were not missing their guest of honor.

  Rounding a corner, I reached for the handle of yet another door. It was locked. Curious, I pulled out a hairpin and set to work on the complex mechanism. When it finally clicked open, I cautiously shone my light through the entrance before stepping inside and turning the handle lock behind me.