Stolen Songbird (The Malediction Series Book 1) by Danielle L. Jensen

Author:Danielle L. Jensen [Jensen, Danielle L.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: CLA
Published: 2020-07-03T00:00:00+00:00

He recited the words quickly. “It isn’t very good, as far as poems go. But it is clear.”

Clear on the surface, maybe, but binding the two of us obviously wasn’t all it would take.

Tristan settled down in the chair across from me, nibbling on a fingernail. “Any ideas?” He seemed oddly nervous given that we sat alone in a library.

I brooded on it for a moment, not liking the only idea that came to mind. “I think we need to track her down and kill her.”

Tristan rubbed his hands across his eyes. “Do you think we haven’t tried?”

“I don’t know what you have or haven’t done,” I snapped, annoyed that he was fighting me on this. “No one has bothered to tell me.”

“Then let me tell you now. For years after the Fall, humanity avoided Trollus like the plague, which wasn’t surprising given the way they’d been treated. But eventually, greed drove them back.”

“Gold?” I asked.

“Always the gold. Trollus had plenty of wealth, but no food. When the first men found their way back in, do you think that is what Xavier asked them for? No. First, he sent them after her. Wealth beyond their wildest dreams if they could produce the corpse of the witch. Countless women resembling her were slaughtered, but never the right one. His people were dying of starvation, but his entire focus was on hunting her down. Only when his own larders grew lean did he turn his resources to establishing trade for food. And they called him the Savior for it.”

“If there was ever a chance of finding her, it was then. Her face was well known. But the humans were not unhappy with the results of what she had done.” He tapped the book in front of me. “This doesn’t tell the whole story—not even half of it. There are things we did that no king would allow to be written, because that would mean they could never be forgotten.”

“Such as?”

“Such as feeding humans the flesh of their own dead while troll aristocracy feasted in their palaces. Sending humans like rats into the labyrinth with promises of riches if they found a way out. Slaughtering human babies and using their mothers like milk cows for troll infants. And once the humans had all fled, doing the same to half-blood women.”

I held up a hand to make him stop, his words making me feel breathless and unwell. What he was telling me was shocking, but looking at the expressions of the kings above us, I could well imagine them giving the orders.

“But human memories are short, it seems,” Tristan continued. “They soon forgot the atrocities of Trollus, or perhaps their greed overwhelmed their fear. They agreed to continue the hunt for the promise of gold. When it became clear she would not be found through her physical description, the hunt turned on women who followed her practices.”

“The witch trials?” He had my attention now. The trials happened once a generation, at least. I’d been

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