One Dark Window (The Shepherd King, #1)

by Rachel Gillig

Yellow girl, soft and clean. Yellow girl, plain—unseen. Yellow girl, overlooked. Yellow girl, won’t be Queen.

But he was more than a soldier to me. He was my father. Like Spindles before him, he was a man of few words. When he chose to speak, his voice was deep, sharp, like the jagged stones that lingered in shadow beneath a drawbridge.

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.

The voice in my head slipped through my mind, like wind whistling through a window. The Hawthorn tree carries few seeds. Its branches are weary, it’s lost all its leaves. Be wary the man who bargains and thieves. He’ll offer your soul to get what he needs.

Be wary the pink, Be wary the rose. Be wary of beauty divine, unopposed. Her thorns will grow sharp, She’ll eat her own heart. Be wary of beauty divine, unopposed.

It felt as if a hundred bees had flooded my lungs, their wings fluttering in a torrid panic. I struggled to breathe, heat climbing out of my chest and wrapping around my throat.

The Nightmare leaned forward, honing my eyes. We watched both men, bruised and bloody, place their White Eagle Cards onto Ravyn’s open palm. The moment the Cards touched the Captain’s hand, the white color disappeared.

I trailed him with heavy steps, shooting daggers into his back. I wanted to shout, to break the glass of his control. But I could not find the words. The day had stolen them. And the night had buried them. Weariness was king, and I his servant.

I fought the urge to walk the corridors on tiptoe, my echo so unusual against the castle walls it might have been a specter tucked away behind tapestries, lingering along the long corridors.

Be wary the violet, Be wary the dread. Be wary the glass and the world of the dead. You’ll fast disappear. You’ll tremble in fear. Be wary the glass and the world of the dead.

He stripped the rose’s thorns with his blade. “It’s just a flower. Flowers don’t play games.”

“You and I already carry strange magic. We’re the very things the book warns against, Miss Spindle.”

The stone chamber—enveloped by moss and vines—stood tall at the edge of the mist. How strange it looked, alone in the ruins, unmarked but for one dark window situated on its southernmost wall.

A window. His voice swarmed in my ears, near and far at once, slick with oil. That’s all she ever required. Who? The Spirit of the Wood.

It was an empty laugh, ominous—like falling down a well. Like being eaten by darkness. It stole something from me, leaving me terrified of the place—the doorless chamber—he so desperately wanted me to take him.

I extended my hand. “You’re forgiven. On one condition.” The invisible string tugged the corner of his mouth. “What’s that?” When our hands touched, heat moved into my cheeks. “Call me Elspeth,” I said. “We’re about to commit treason together, after all.”

My aunt had told me once that my strange charcoal eyes were special, beautiful even—a dark window to the soul beneath. But as I glanced back into the looking glass, the reflection of my black eyes flickering to that bright, eerie yellow, I had to wonder… whose soul was it? The Nightmare’s? Or mine?

But it felt incomplete, my collection yet whole. And so, for the Nightmare, I bartered my soul.

Practice restraint, and know it by touch. Use Cards when they’re needed, and never too much. For too much of fire, our swords would all break. Too much of wine a poison doth make. Excess is grievous, be knave, maid, or crown. Too much of water, how easy we drown.

I’m not TAKING anything, Elspeth Spindle. He hissed, claws flashing, suddenly vicious. I cannot TAKE. I am capable only of what I am willfully given.

I had not fit into anyone’s arms like that since childhood. And even then, no one had ever held me so tightly—as if they needed me in their arms as much as I needed to be held. As if nothing else mattered but to hold one another.

There is no escape from the salt. Magic is everywhere—ageless. To the Spirit of the Wood, the exactor of balance, our lives are but of a butterfly—fleeting. Magic is at our birth. So, too, will it be at our death.

Be wary the green, Be wary the trees. Be wary the song of the wood on your sleeves. You’ll step off the path— To blessing and wrath. Be wary the song of the wood on your sleeves.

“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.”