A Royal Guide to Monster Slaying

by Kelley Armstrong

  Jannah’s eyelids flutter. Then they open.

  I let out a whoosh of relief.

  “You’re okay,” I say. “Help will come.”

  “No,” she whispers.

  “Yes, it will come. I’ll get it myself. Hold—”

  Her fingers grip my arm. “No, Rowan. Stay.”

  I look about wildly. The gryphon is in the air. I can’t tell if it’s backing off. I don’t dare leave her if it’s not.

  Malric slumps onto his belly, his muzzle on Jannah’s stomach. Her hand limply falls on his head, and she rubs it.

  “You’ll watch over her, won’t you?” she whispers to the warg. “You’ll stay with Rowan?”

  “Wh-what?” I say.

  She takes a deep, jagged breath, and her hand moves to my arm. “There’s not much time, so listen carefully.”

  “Not much—? No. You’re fine. I’ll—”

  Her grip tightens, cutting me off. “Listen. Please.” She fumbles for her sword, fallen at her side. With her good arm, she pulls it over and places my hand on the grip. “Do you still want this?”

  “Wh-what?”

  “Will you take this?”

  “N-no. It’s yours. You’ll be fine. You’ll—”

  “After I’m gone, will you take it? When the time comes. When you’re ready. Would you give up the throne for the sword?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Her gaze meets mine. “Even after all you’ve seen? Here. Today. After what happened to you. You would still trade?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Good.”

  Her hand covers mine, closing my fingers on the grip of the ebony sword. “Then it will be yours.”

  “But we can’t. Rhydd is the—”

  “Rhydd’s leg is injured. Badly. He’ll never walk properly again.”

  “We don’t know that. It’s hurt, but it can heal—”

  She grips my hand tighter. “No, it is gravely injured, and he will never walk properly again. Tell your mother this is the way. This is the answer. Doctor Fendrel will help. He is loyal to his queen and his land, and he knows this is best. Doctor Fendrel must tell the council that Rhydd will never walk properly again. So he can’t be the royal monster hunter.”

  She meets my gaze. “Think about it, as you return home. If this sword is truly what you want—”

  “It is.”

  “Then tell your mother what I’ve said.” She inhales, her breathing shallow now. “And tell her…tell her that I love her.”

  “What? No. You can tell her—”

  Her hand rises to my chin. “You will be a glorious monster hunter, Rowan. Seeing you in that beast’s clutches, fighting your way free…you will be the stuff of legend. I only wish I could be there to see it. I wish I could be there to train—”

  Her eyes roll back, her lids closing.

  “Jannah!”

  Her eyelids crack open, lips curving into a pained smile. “Still here? Good. Go to Wilmot. He will train you. There’s time. Plenty of time before you wield the sword. He will help. Beg him if you must. Tell him I begged. Tell him…tell him…” She’s breathing the words now, barely audible as her eyelids flag. “Tell him I’m sorry.”

  Her eyes close, and her body goes still, and I scream as Malric begins to howl.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  y aunt is dead.

  My aunt dead, my brother gravely wounded. I am alive…and so is the gryphon. I hate us both for that. The gryphon is gone. Because it was already injured, the rush of hunters proved too much for it, and it flew back toward the mountains.

  I hurt so much that I barely even feel my injuries. The pain of grief is worse. My insides are empty, rubbed raw, and all I want is my mother. I want my mom, and I want my dad, and I want my aunt, and I’ll never see two of those people again, and I can barely breathe thinking about it.

  As for my physical injuries, the local village healer says I have a bruised chest, a bump on my skull and the arrow puncture in my shoulder. She’s done what she can for me. Compared to my brother, though, I am fine.

  His leg is broken. Shattered, according to the village healer, with three breaks in his calf. He should not have been able to walk onto that battlefield. But he did. He forced himself to walk onto it. And I hid in a haystack and let my aunt die.

  That’s not how it happened. In my mind, I know that. In my heart and my gut, though, that’s what it feels like—as if I spent the entire battle huddled under the hay. My aunt is dead, and that’s all that matters to me.

  It’s a quiet ride home. The healer wanted me in the wagon with Rhydd, but I only do that when my brother needs me. Otherwise, I force myself to ride, with my aunt’s sword over my lap and Courtois’s reins in my hand as I lead him.

  The unicorn follows as docile as a weary nag. Malric walks behind the second wagon, the one that carries my aunt’s body. The jackalope snuggles in behind me and never once tries to climb onto my shoulders. The beasts sense the mood, and they are as subdued as the hunters.

  Each step seems to take forever. And each step seems to take no time at all, if that makes any sense. Time passes in a blur, and when we have to stop for the horses, I look around, startled at where we are, feeling as if I’ve slept through the ride. But I don’t sleep. I just…shut down. Shut down and try not to feel anything and feel everything instead.

  We don’t ride through the castle village. I need to tell Mom what happened before she hears it from anyone else. So I direct the hunters to take a rough side road in, and they obey without question. As soon as the castle spires rise over distant trees, I hand Courtois’s lead to another hunter. Then I prod my gelding to a trot.

  I take off in a cloud of dust. Behind me, Malric barks, as if startled. His giant paws thunder along the dirt road. When he catches up, he glowers and growls my way. I ignore him and push the gelding to a canter, and Malric runs at my side.

  I make it to the castle gates far ahead of the others. A scout spots me, and by the time I reach those gates, my mother is flying through them, Berinon behind her. She has her skirts in hand, running as fast as she can.

  I lift the ebony sword in both hands, and my mother’s gaze goes from it to the warg at my side. She falters. Then she rocks forward, and Berinon races up to catch her. I lift the sword over my head as tears spill. Then I collapse onto my gelding’s neck, sobbing.

  * * *

  We’re inside my mother’s chambers. I’m on her lap, like I’m a little girl again. I sob on her shoulder as she rocks me and cries softly. When I recover, I pull back, embarrassed, but she holds me there, her arms tight around me.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m so sorry. I snuck off to look after Rhydd, and then this happened. We thought the villagers mistook a manticore for a gryphon. After Jannah took down the manticore, I wanted to tend to the injured livestock, and that’s when the gryphon struck.”

  “Drawn by the smell of blood,” Berinon murmurs as he crouches beside us. “The slaughter of the livestock.”

  I nod. “I wasn’t ready. I was distracted. The gryphon crashed through the roof, and it grabbed me. That’s how Rhydd got hurt, protecting me. If I wasn’t there—”

  “Rowan—” Berinon begins.

  I hurry on. “The gryphon took me, and that’s why Jannah had to go after it. That’s why she had to fight it alone.”

  My mother pales. “T-took you?”

  “In its talons. It was flying off with me and—”

  Berinon grips my shoulder. “Your mother doesn’t need all the details. Not if we ever want her sleeping again.” He turns to her. “Rowan got away, Mari. On her own. That’s what the hunters said. In flight, she plucked an arrow from her own shoulder and cut the beast’s tendon while it was low enough for her to fall safely. That will be a story for the bards.”

  “I only used the arrow because I lost my sword. I don’t know how I dropped it.”

  He smiles. “Because a gryphon burst through the roof and grabbed you?”

  My mother
looks like she’s going to be sick.

  “Mari? She’s fine,” Berinon says. “As for making Jannah attack the gryphon, Rowan, your aunt would have done that anyway, with or without the support of her hunters. The manticore’s rampage attracted the gryphon. Jannah believed the villagers had mistaken a manticore for a gryphon. She would have verified that—by speaking to other witnesses—but she didn’t get the chance. The gryphon caught everyone off guard. If it hadn’t grabbed you, it would have taken Rhydd. You saved your brother, Rowan. The hunters told me you threw yourself over him. You went there to protect Rhydd, and you did, and there is no use speculating on other outcomes. You were wrong to leave, but you did exactly what you set out to do.” His hand grips my shoulder. “We are proud of you.”

  Mom hugs me. “Berinon is right. You did a foolish thing, but for a good reason. You saved Rhydd. You saved yourself. No one…” Her breath catches. “No one could have saved Jannah.”

  “The hunters say you were with her at the end,” Berinon says. “That’s a blessing.”

  “I…I guess so. Mom? She wanted me to tell you that she loves you.”

  My mother looks away, but I can still see her face, contorted with grief.

  “And there’s more,” I say quickly. “That’s why I rode ahead.”

  I tell her Jannah’s idea about using Rhydd’s injuries to change our fate. To make me the royal monster hunter, and him the king.

  When I finish, my mother stares at me, as if struggling to make sense of what I said, her mind still on Jannah.

  “What does your brother think of this?” Berinon asks.

  “I haven’t told him. I can’t. It’s…” I struggle for the right words. “He doesn’t want to be the royal monster hunter. He’d rather be king. But he can’t say that. He can’t even agree to it. That would be wrong.”

  Berinon nods. “It’s asking him to take the crown that is rightfully his sister’s. To take the highest position in the land. And give you the most dangerous one.”

  “Rowan was correct,” Mom says. “We can’t put this decision on Rhydd. We must make it for him.” She looks at me. “Do you understand what that would mean, Rowan?”

  “I do. I told Jannah that I agreed, and she told me to think about it. I have. Nothing’s changed. I’ll give up the throne. I’ll take the sword.”

  “All right, then. Let me speak to Doctor Fendrel.”

  * * *

  Doctor Fendrel tells the council that my brother can’t be the royal monster hunter. His leg is shattered. He will never walk without a crutch.

  The truth is that Doctor Fendrel doesn’t know how well my brother’s leg will heal. As the physician told my mother privately, Rhydd may be able to forgo a crutch, but he will always have a limp.

  “The answer is simple,” my mother says after the doctor leaves. “Rhydd’s leg does not prevent him from sitting on the ivory throne. Rowan will take up the ebony sword.”

  “Simple,” Heward murmurs. “Conveniently simple.”

  My mother meets his gaze, her eyes still red from crying. “My sister is dead. My son has been lamed. Nothing in that is convenient, cousin.”

  Berinon clears his throat. “I believe we should count our blessings that a change of plans is so simply done. That Rhydd will be as apt a ruler as his sister. That Rowan will be as skilled a royal hunter as her brother.”

  “Are you sure about that?” Heward says.

  “Rowan saved her brother from a gryphon,” Mom says. “She escaped it herself. In flight. My daughter is Clan Dacre. She has the gift. Have you seen her new companion? Jackalopes are untamable…yet Rowan tamed one without even trying.”

  Heward sniffs. “It’s a very young beast. Orphaned. Starving and desperate.”

  It takes Mom a moment to answer calmly. From my royal lessons, I know she must. When she stands before the council, she is the queen, not Jannah’s sister or our mother. No matter how much she’s hurting, she must do this. Just as I must stand by her chair, even as my aching body screams for me to sit. Berinon had offered me a seat, but I had refused to take it. Malric stands as well, at my side, refusing to rest his own injuries.

  My mother finds her composure and gestures to Malric. “Jannah’s warg has not left Rowan’s side since she returned. Courtois allowed her to lead him back. He let her stable him. The beasts know. They understand. As did Jannah, when she handed Rowan the ebony sword, knowing Rhydd’s injuries were grave.”

  “So you believe Rowan is ready to be the royal monster hunter.”

  My mother’s mouth opens. Then she pauses. I watch her carefully. She looks like a beast scenting a trap. When she speaks, it is slow, reasoned. “I believe she will be ready. She has already undergone her basic preparation, and with additional training—”

  “How much training?”

  “By the time she is sixteen—”

  “We can’t wait four years for a royal monster hunter. You know clan law, Mariela. If the royal monster hunter perishes before the hunter-elect is fully trained, the royal line shifts.”

  “To your children,” my mother says, her voice low with warning.

  “Mine are not children. My daughter is twenty, my son eighteen. They have been trained for this possibility and they are old enough to succeed you and Jannah right now, in accordance with our law. Since Rowan is not ready—”

  “I am,” I say.

  Mom’s hand rises to silence me, but I surge forward, pretending not to see it. I can’t, however, pretend I don’t see Berinon’s face—his expression warning me.

  Don’t be careless. Don’t leap into a fight you cannot win.

  “I will be ready,” I amend. “I can be. Give me one”—I catch Berinon’s look—“two years. I can be ready for my ordeals in two years.”

  Two council members nod as if this sounds reasonable to them.

  I straighten. “In two years, I will be a fully trained monster hunter, ready to—”

  “Not good enough,” Heward says. “We have a gryphon on the loose. One that has already killed a royal monster hunter. I propose that we allow my son to hunt it. If he returns with its head, then we know who has earned the ebony sword.”

  “That is not—” my mother begins.

  “—not necessary,” I cut in. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t mean to interrupt. But the gryphon has retreated. It’s injured, and it returned to the mountains.”

  “To heal,” Heward says. “Then it will come back. They always come back. It will return before winter.”

  “Perhaps that’s where we can meet on this,” says one of the council members. That’s Liliath—my mother’s aunt, and the only one who’d voted against sending Rhydd on the hunt. “Give Rowan until the first snowfall to train. At that time, if the gryphon returns, she must join the hunting party. If they slay it, then we will grant her two years of training before she must complete her ordeals.”

  “One year,” Heward says. “And with the gryphon, she must strike the killing blow.”

  Liliath shakes her head. “We will not go that far. We will simply say that she must fight the beast. She can’t watch others do it for her.”

  The two other council members nod their agreement.

  There’s a long pause before Heward says, “All right. The princess may train until the gryphon returns. At that time, she must fight and slay it. If she does not, then my son will. When he defeats the beast, he will win the sword, and his sister will take the crown.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  he matter isn’t decided that easily. The council debates, but ultimately all four agree, and my mother cannot win further concessions. She sweeps out with Berinon, and I follow.

  I’m passing my own quarters when something hits the door. Claws scrabble at the wood, and I can hear chattering. As I continue past, another thud shakes my door.

  I glance at Malric, padding along behind me. The warg sighs. My mother is right that Malric is sticking close, but it’s with the reluctance of a kid forced to babysit a much younger—and ter
ribly annoying—sibling. Jannah told him to watch out for me, and he understood enough to know what she was asking, so he does it. But I suspect, deep in that warg brain of his, he’s wondering whether anyone would notice if he snuck out and hightailed it back to the mountains.

  Another thud. I push open the door…and the jackalope charges out and head-butts my legs.

  I stagger back. “Excuse me?”

  The jackalope looks up quickly, realizing what he’s hit is not the door. Seeing me, he chirps in delight and starts scaling my leg. I heft him onto my shoulder. Malric sighs again, his jowls fluttering, and casts a longing look into my quarters.

  “Go on,” I say. “Rest. You’ve been wounded, too.”

  He’s dotted with sticking plasters, yet like me, he’s ignoring his injuries, as if—compared to others’—they don’t bear notice. Still, he seizes the excuse to lumber into my quarters while I take off with the jackalope.

  When I near my mother’s quarters, her voice drifts into the hall. “Rowan is twelve. Twelve. On her birthday, I told her that makes her a woman. It does not.”

  “Yes.”

  “Is that all you’re going to say, Ber?”

  “What else can be said? You are correct. And it does not matter. Heward wants his family on the throne. Now he can achieve that by simply following clan law. I know you don’t want to hear this, Mari, but in amending his demand, the council is being somewhat reasonable.”

  I swear my mother growls at that. Her shoes click on the stone floor, as if she’s pacing. Then she says, “I know they are. They’re giving Rowan a chance.”

  “It’s possible the gryphon won’t return this winter. If so, she has another year to train. Even if the gryphon does return, she won’t have to slay it alone. What we must do now is plan. Send her to train with Wilmot, as Jannah wanted.”

  “Wilmot hasn’t seen Jannah in ten years. He has refused all my summons. He will not train my daughter.”

  “For Jannah—”

  “He will not. Jannah made her choice, and he hates all of us for it.”