Stolen Songbird(46)

“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.