Page 1 of The Bone King and the Starling

PROLOGUE

Iwatch the young thrall wash blood off of her hands in the fountain, enrapt. She does not see me in the shadows. I do not want her to. I don’t want any of them to. Not yet. For now, I’ve come only to watch.

The wind picks at the cloak disguising my armor. I pull the hood low as much to protect from the wind as to hide my face. The thrall wears no such cloak. She wears only a battered dress and shoes that look ill-fitting when she takes a few steps back towards the house she was thrown from. She stops, turning at the sound of laughter.

Before her abrupt arrival, I had been watching the drunks in the town square fall over each other as they exited the longhouse. I’m pretty sure one of the men was the chief of this small village, but I would need the morning’s light to know for certain. The thrall disregards the men now, but she still does not return to the building she was thrown from. I wonder what evil or ill keeps her at bay. What fear does she have that is greater than the cold? From the little of this town I have seen so far fromthe anonymity afforded to me by cloak and shadow, I can only guess.

The town is poor. That does not surprise me. When I first told my men I wanted to host the next games here, despite the many larger cities that may have been more suitable, many grumbled and spat. I did not have many volunteers interested in crossing the western woods by horseback. One of the only villages that is not accessible to Ithanuir by boat. It was a nuisance, and yet, I do not question the gods, for it was their hands that guided me. And I am surprised, confused even, by what I have found.

Though the poverty of this place may not surprise me, what does surprise me is how poor the poorest are compared to the town’s wealthier inhabitants. The thrall, for example. Her hair is a natural riot of curls unlike most of the other villagers in this place, yet where many others have tight patterns of intricate braids in the common style of this region, hers hangs long down her back, few braids that there are, tattered.

Her skirts look dirty, even in the moonlight. I cannot see much of her face as she watches the doorway to what looks like a kitchen, though I can see the face of the young male villager who approaches her from the back.

Blond and well fed, laden with muscle, he wears a cloak similar to mine and hide boots that glint in the moonlight as he makes his way across the square. He catches the thrall by the elbow as she idles near the fountain and pulls her around to face him, as if it is his right.

An unpleasant feeling stirs low in my gut, seeing her touched. The fact that she does not enjoy his touch only amplifies it. She rips her arm away from him, but he pushes her chest, forcing her back towards the fountain. When the backs of her skirts brush the stone lip of the fountain and she wobbles, he grabs her by the throat and shoves her backwards, holding her suspended over the shallow water.

I am moving, though I had no intention of doing anything more than watch tonight. Intervening here could jeopardize all of my plans for this village, for these games. But as I move, it is as if I do not have a choice. My bones have begun to sing, telling me to close in, stop this. Closer, I can hear this boy’s harsh words on the wind, “You will not deny me much longer. And when I finally have you, the things I will do to that little cunt…”

I grab the boy by the shoulder, wrenching him back and bringing my wrist down hard across his forearm, though not quite hard enough to break it. I shove him off of the thrall and he stumbles towards the hall. The expression on his face as he turns his gaze up to me is positively laughable.

“You dare,” the boy shouts at me — me.

The sudden splitting reminder that he cannot see my face or identify me by my armor catches me off guard. I chuckle. I am unused to being treated as only a man.

“You dare laugh at me? I am Tori, son of Gilead, and this whore here belongs to me.”

“I’m not a whore,” the thrall says, surprising me.

“Don’t talk back to me.” The boy called Tori advances on her as if I’m not even there, like he doesn’t even see my body, he is so fixated on the girl. He has hate in his eyes, more than desire. I pity her for the things he will do. And he will do them. Males like him in villages like this live unrestrained. At least, they did.

I punch the boy in the gut as he lunges towards her. The pressure of my fist is enough to cause him to buckle and collapse onto the cobblestones. I wait for him to rise. He does not. He merely continues to spit insults up at me and writhe there like a wounded animal, so I grab him beneath one arm and leg and toss the whimpering coward into the fountain.

A group of drunks standing nearby laugh and I chuckle with them at how long it takes the stupid, malignant parasite of a boy to remove himself from the icy water. As warm as this fall nightis, he still cannot afford to be outside more than moments. For that reason only, I imagine, he spews a few more foul curses in my direction — leveling another curse at the thrall, too — before staggering off down a street to the left, taking him away from here. Away from her.

“He will be back,” I tell the girl, turning to face her while making sure to give her space.

She is looking after the boy, tracking the alley he disappeared behind and keeping her back to me as she does so. And when he’s finally gone, only then does she let her shoulders droop. “I know. Thank you, sir, for intervening. He has grown more bold with the games so close.”

She turns around and tilts her face up to look at me. I know she cannot see me beneath my hood, against the light of the bright white moon. It is full tonight.

But I can see her.

Beneath the shimmering, supernatural light of the gods — gods who already took their sacrifice from my men and women on this night — I see her face in full clarity and everything, simply everything in the gods’ expansive earth, comes together.

Time unwinds like a spool of thread. My body grows hot beneath my armor and I know that I will have many more gods to thank for this before the night is through. Raya, goddess of small creatures, for sending me the raven from the east — the first sign I received to come to this small village when I could have used a much larger, more important town to host these games. Aquenius, god of water, for laying the watermark on the map. Resenia, moon goddess, for showing us her most precious gift in all its fullness here in this square right now so that I might see this female before me in the light and marvel. To Ghabari for what will come next.

I swallow and choke, surprised by the sudden way my throat works.

The female tilts her head and squints. “You are not from Winterbren, sir.” Her voice is pitched as a question, so delicate and strong in equal parts. Her hands fiddle nervously in her apron-covered skirts. The brown of her skin appears silver in this light.

She is simply beautiful.

Though to be sure, there is nothing simple about her beauty. The way she has been put together is unlike anything I have seen, and in the capital Ithanuir, I see all kinds, all shapes, all colors. She has brown skin, though it’s difficult to assess the exact shade. Her hair is dark curls that cling to the beauty of her face. A few loose braids hold the mass back so that I can see her clearly. Ragged though they may be, I’m grateful for them now.

She has high cheeks and eyes that tilt up towards her hairline. Her brow is soft, as is the slope of her nose, which is perfectly proportioned and round. Her mouth is full. So full. Her upper lip is tiny compared to the bottom. My hand twitches in my cloak. My thumb aches to drag across her mouth, to test that softness with my own rough skin. To feel it crumble beneath me like an army beneath my axe. I want to conquer her.

The thought is as harsh as it as consuming. I want to conquer her. But it is true. I have never wanted anything more.

---