Two Twisted Crowns (The Shepherd King, #2)

by Rachel Gillig

There is a strange sort of finding in losing.

The Twin Alders is hidden in a place with no time. A place of great sorrow and bloodshed and crime. Betwixt ancient trees, where the mist cuts bone-deep, the last Card remains, waiting, asleep. The wood knows no road—no path through the snare. Only I can find the Twin Alders… For it was I who left it there.

I love that it starts exactly where book one ended!

But his soul carried on, buried deep in Elspeth Spindle, the only woman Ravyn had ever loved.

“What is he after?” “Balance,” she answered, head tilting like a bird of prey. “To right terrible wrongs. To free Blunder from the Rowans.” Her yellow eyes narrowed, wicked and absolute. “To collect his due.”

“Aemmory Percyval Taxus.” He dragged his gauntlets across the sand. “That’s my name.”

“There once was a girl,” he said, his voice slick, “clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a King—a shepherd by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two were the same: “The girl, the King, and the monster they became.”

“Listen closely. The journey to the twelfth Card will three barters take. The first comes at water—a dark, mirrored lake. The second begins at the neck of a wood, where you cannot turn back, though truly, you should.” The Nightmare’s gaze shifted to Ravyn. His words came out sharp, as if to draw blood. “The last barter waits in a place with no time. A place of great sorrow and bloodshed and crime. No sword there can save you, no mask hide your face. You’ll return with the Twin Alders… “But you’ll never leave that place.”

“The dark bird has three heads,” Emory said, his voice strangled, an invisible rope around his neck. “Highwayman, Destrier, and another. One of age, of birthright. Tell me, Ravyn Yew, after your long walk in my wood—do you finally know your name?”

“Who are you?” “Blunder’s reckoning.” The Shepherd King’s grin was worse than any snarl. “I am the root and the tree. I am balance.”

“Let’s just say I’ve never had anything like that. I was too concerned with losing him to note that Elspeth was losing herself until it was far too late.”

She has a name, parasite. Say it. Or don’t speak of her at all.

Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call. Quiet and guarded and windblown and marred, its bark whispers stories of a boy-Prince once scarred. His voice in Ravyn’s mind went eerily soft. And so, Ravyn Yew, your Elm I won’t touch. His life strays beyond my ravenous clutch. For a kicked pup grows teeth, and teeth sink to bone. I will need him, one day, when I harvest the throne.

“Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, forever his mark. Alone in the castle, Prince of the dark.”

what?! Elm must be a half brother...

They decided to announce the marriage contract that night—to put a stake in the heart of pageantry and end the feasts a day early.

uh oh...

It was Hauth.

yeuuup

The Nightmare was still a long while. Then, so quiet it might have been waves upon the shore, he said, “You would bleed in Elspeth’s place? In my place?” Ravyn straightened his shoulders and spoke with enough conviction to reach every one of the Nightmare’s five hundred years. “Yes.”

Infinite. “For even dead, I will not die. I am the shepherd of shadow. The phantom of the fright. The demon in the daydream. The nightmare in the night.”

When he finally said the words, he knew, with every piece of himself, that they were true. “Taxus. My name is Taxus.”

He didn’t mention the Maiden Card he’d taken back from Ione—didn’t attribute his sudden recovery to anything but himself. But he was undeniably using it.

sounds like every dictator

A smile haunted the Nightmare’s silken timbre. “How poetic. I couldn’t have asked for a better Solstice.” He put his mouth to Ravyn’s ear. “Now, stupid bird, will you listen to my plan?”

Clever men died on their own terms. And if they were wary, clever, and good, they perhaps died in peace. He, apparently, was none of the three.

His eyes rolled back in his head, and when he spoke, his voice was strange, smooth—as if slick with oil. “You won’t win,” he said again. “For nothing is safe, and nothing is free. Debt follows all men, no matter their plea. When the Shepherd returns, a new day shall ring. Death to the Rowans.” His gray eyes focused, homing in on Elm. “Long live the King.”

The Nightmare and I stared. We seem to have missed something rather important, I said. Small mercies.

😂

The Nightmare’s hands shook on his sword. Unflinching, five hundred years old, he looked down at Ravyn, his lost descendant, and trembled. “I wanted a better Blunder for her. If you perish, that Blunder will never exist.”

I could not see him, but I knew the Shepherd King with golden armor was with us. For he was the Nightmare, and the Nightmare was the King, and I was both of them.

“Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, but washes the realm. First of his name—King of the Elms.”

For a terrible moment, nothing happened. Then, one by one, the Providence Cards disappeared.

Gilded, bloodstained. Two twisted crowns.

“But Elspeth’s magic is… strange. If she touches the Shepherd Card, she will absorb it. Every last barter—every payment I made. All twelve Providence Cards.” He shook his head. “She will not be healed.”

“Goodbye, Taxus. Be wary. Be clever. Be good.” He waited ten minutes in the meadow. Then tore the Nightmare Card in two.

We said the final words together, our voices echoing, listless, through the dark. A final note. An eternal farewell. And the monster they became.

it said "monsters" in the audiobook, and I LOVE the plural there!

A twig snapped to my left, and my gaze shot to the trees. And I must have been slow to understand, after a lifetime of gray mist, just how brilliant the sunlight was. Because for a moment—a fleeting, wonderful moment—I thought I saw him. Yellow eyes, peering at me through the trees. But it was only the sun,

And though it had taken slow, painful time, I knew who I was without him. I was more than the girl, the King, and the monster of Blunder’s dark, twisted tale. I was its author.