Two Twisted Crowns (The Shepherd King, #2)

by Rachel Gillig

“Elspeth Spindle,” he said quietly, his eyes—so strange and yellow—ensnaring me. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“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.”

“Men have no use for the Maiden. What is beauty to real power? My father never let me touch his Providence Cards. But the Maiden—the Maiden I was gifted freely, like a horse a lump of sugar. Something sweet to distract me from the bit they shoved in my mouth.” She lowered her chin, hair spilling over her shoulder. “Is it any wonder, if women discovered the Maiden’s true potential, its healing power, that they kept it a secret?”

“I’d be your King, but always your servant. Never your keeper.”

And now you know that every terrible thing that happened in Blunder took place long before I handed Brutus Rowan a Scythe. It happened because, five hundred years ago, a boy wore a crown—had every abundance in the world—but always asked for MORE.

There were not enough pages in all the books Elm had read, in all the libraries he’d wandered, in all the notebooks he’d scrawled, that could measure—denote or describe—just how beautiful she was. “There you are.”

Kings and monsters can be made, and butterflies can be crushed.

Elspeth Spindle. I’m not sure who that is without you. You will learn. You’ll meet yourself—without me—soon enough.

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.