One Dark Window (The Shepherd King, #1)

by Rachel Gillig

Still, it was the first time I stopped fearing the Nightmare—the voice in my head, the creature with strange yellow eyes and an eerie, smooth voice. Eleven years later, and I don’t fear him at all. Even if I should.

Providence Cards were not only Blunder’s greatest treasures but also the only legal way of performing magic. Anyone could use them—all it took was touch and intention. Clear your mind, hold a Card in your hand, tap it three times, and the Card was yours to wield. Pocket the Card or place it elsewhere, the magic would still hold. Three more taps, or the touch of another person, and the flow of magic would halt.

In his description of the Nightmare Card, the Shepherd King wrote of one’s deepest fears brought to light—of hauntings and terror. I waited to be frightened, for dreams, for nightmares. But they did not come. I clenched my jaw to keep from screaming every time I entered a dark room, certain he would rip through the silence with a terrifying screech, but he remained quiet. He did not haunt me.

My magic moves, he said. My magic bites. My magic soothes. My magic frights. You are young and not so bold. I am unflinching—five hundred years old.

“Is this you pretending, Elspeth?” he said, the tip of his nose grazing mine. “Because if it is…” His breath stirred my eyelashes. “You’re very good at it.”

“Does this feel pretend?” he said,

But it felt incomplete, my collection yet whole. And so, for the Nightmare, I bartered my soul. I put a hand to my mouth, fingers shaking. My voice came out hollow. “But that would mean I absorbed your soul when I touched the Nightmare Card. Which makes you… the Shepherd King.” A growl, a sneer—oil, bile. His voice called, louder than it had ever been, as if he was closer. Stronger. Finally, my darling Elspeth, we understand one another.

“And that was nothing to the wicked things I was imagining after we argued in the garden.” I let out an abrupt breath, warmth twisting deep in my stomach. “I resisted,” Ravyn said, “because I haven’t stopped thinking about you since that first night on the forest road. And I realized at Equinox that the closer I let myself get to you, the less I’d want to be the King’s Captain—the less I’d want to pretend. And it’s dangerous for me, for my family, to stop pretending.” He pressed his lips to the shell of my ear, a low, scraping whisper. “It’s not safe to draw too close to me. I’m a liar, Elspeth. A traitor. And someday, there will be a reckoning.” He pulled back, his gray eyes tight with strain. “The highwayman meets the hangman. Always.”

“There once was a girl,” he said, “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…”

“Are you still pretending?” I said, reveling in his gaze. Ravyn gave a surprised laugh and, in front of everyone, leaned in and kissed me. “I never was,” he whispered into my lips.

“Be safe,” I whispered to the wind as Ravyn Yew disappeared beyond the gate. Had I known they’d be the last words I’d say to him aloud, I might have chosen them differently.