The Curse of the Nightingale (The Siren Queen Trilogy #1)

Prologue

Someone was going to burn.

Logan Chastain watched the executioner’s platform through the open door of his apothecary, his thoughts distant as he molded medicinal tablets.

The little spheres of herbs and honey became irregular as his concentration broke.

Just outside the guild hall, in the center of the town square, a crew of men were assembling a pyre.

Ordinarily when an execution was scheduled in Finn’s Hollow, Logan set aside a draught for the condemned.

Extracting the values of opium, hemlock, and henbane, he’d draw a lethal tincture that numbed its user to all pain.

Sometimes the criminal would choose to go without, wishing to feel those final moments of life.

More often than not, they begged for the mercy of anesthetics.

It was public knowledge that the Chastains provided such a service, so Logan had come to know the executioner well over the years, and he was given exclusive access to the prisoners just before they set foot on that marble platform.

This time was different. He’d been given permission to see the prisoner, but she was guilty of witchcraft, and giving comfort to condemned witches was itself considered a crime.

As volunteers erected the stake at the center of the pyre, Logan wondered who in their right mind would risk such a visitation.

Even if it were legal to do so, associating with a witch was dangerous on its own.

He closed up shop at sunset. His neighbors remained outside the guild hall, gossiping with quiet intrigue.

Connor Millthorne, the tailor, perked up at the sight of Logan and crossed over to him.

The dirt square was bustling as people loitered outside of market stalls and colorful shops, gathering as if a festival was about to begin.

Connor eyed the stake. “I thought burnings were outlawed.”

“For traitors, you are correct,” Logan replied. He rubbed the back of his neck, skin prickling from the subject. “The laws regarding witches haven’t changed.”

“A witch? You can’t mean they’ve finally captured Laetitia?”

Logan gave a grim look. “If by ‘they’, you mean Taran Banewight.”

There weren’t many witches left in Gallae, but the few who existed were hunted relentlessly.

Fewer still were their pursuers, the Banewights, a skilled order of supernatural huntsmen.

Laetitia had evaded capture for some time, roaming in the woods and residing solely in temporary structures.

Finding her must have been quite the feat for Taran; it was said she left no footprints when she walked, and that she was capable of changing her face so that no one alive knew her true form.

Logan wondered whether the disguise would melt away in the flames, then chastised himself for the macabre idea.

“Logan!”

The call came from Sieur Aron, a former knight of the realm who couldn’t seem to retire from the act of killing.

He was a hulking mass with a long grey beard that still had life and copper in its tips.

That same vibrancy was absent in his eyes.

Logan had never seen anything but darkness in the executioner’s steeled gaze.

Logan crossed the dirt yard and braced a foot on the marble. “You summoned me, Sieur?”

“Have you gone to see Laetitia?” asked Sieur Aron. “It’s time.”

“I won’t be risking it. Besides, what am I to do? Taunt her? I can give her nothing.”

Sieur Aron exhaled slowly. “I wasn’t sure, either.”

Logan frowned and turned his eyes to the pyre. The executioner tracked his focus.

“She’s a foul woman, Logan. People have died. Children…”

Logan averted his gaze. His wife, Petra, was pregnant; so the subject carried extra weight. “I know. Perhaps I should go home… I’d rather not watch. As a man of medicine, it is difficult to endure the suffering of others, witch or not.”

Sieur Aron grunted. To him, justice meant a punishment befitting the crime, and sometimes that meant people burned.

Just as Logan turned to leave, the square fell quiet, its inhabitants giving a wide berth to the arriving procession.

A pair of hooded priestesses walked at either side of Laetitia, whose arms were bound tight to her back.

She was a pretty thing, with hair of silver-blonde and fair, unblemished skin, but she wore an unmistakable fear in her eyes when she beheld the pyre, and her focus shifted quickly to Logan.

He’d seen this woman before. She was a frequent customer, often stopping for herbs that were harder to forage, but he’d never known her to be a witch.

Behind her walked the Banewight. His fearsome reputation painted a different picture than what now entered the square; by the tales alone, Logan half-expected to see a giant standing there.

Instead, he saw a shorter fellow of stocky build, one who was grazing the edge of manhood, though there was a strange gravity to his step and a sinister aura about him.

They proceeded to the stage, passing Logan on their way to the pyre. While the priestesses bound Laetitia to the stake, she spoke out to him directly.

“Master Chastain! Finally, a good man,” she said, her voice shaking beneath a calm facade. “Please, sir, as a last favor to a longtime customer, won’t you go and fetch me something for the pain?”

He could feel the eyes of the village on him and remained still. Even the Banewight had turned his attention to him.

Laetitia parted her lips, then tried again. “Goodman, they’ll burn me alive.”

Logan took a breath, an unnatural tightness squeezing at his throat. “I know.”

The witch trembled against her bindings. “I am but a terrified woman, Master Chastain. Please, have mercy.”

“You’re no woman, you’re a witch,” corrected Sieur Aron, nodding to the Banewight. “Go on, Logan. Go home.”

As if permission were all he’d awaited, Logan’s body freed itself from its stasis. He took his foot from the marble and stepped away, turning his back on Laetitia.

“Master Logan Chastain!” she cried, fear swelling in her voice. “Please!”

Perhaps it was only the desire to not appear cowardly that stilled him once more. He snapped his head toward her. “I will not ease your suffering, witch. Goddess reclaim you from the god you serve. May your spirit be cleansed of its abomination.”

Laetitia fell quiet at last. The priestesses nodded to one another and began a prayer for the same liberation, and Sieur Aron retrieved a torch. All the while, the Banewight stood in front of her with crossed arms and a stern glower.

Logan started to leave when the fire took, but panicked screams stopped him once more. The few villagers in the square backed up as far as they could manage, too intrigued to leave and too terrified to come closer.

He wanted to run, to get away from the awful sound, but there was no way to escape its range—he’d hear it all the way to his log house at the edge of the woods.

“Master Logan Chastain!” Laetitia managed to squeal, the smell of her impending death filling the square.

The fire consumed her legs first, quickly spreading up the whole of her dress.

A wild look possessed her, and for a moment it seemed as if the flames came from inside of her, a manifestation of her wrath.

Logan flinched, incapable of moving. “You will have a daughter, sir, and as my pleas fell on deaf ears, let her voice be her curse! As the whole rotten lot of you are heartless, let any man who hears the sound of your daughter’s voice be moved to a covetous, irrevocable love, and may she never know what it is to scream before an audience that yearns for her death! ”

The last of her words were shrill, escalating until all she could release were unholy wails of torment. Logan’s heartbeat countered the sounds of anguish, throbbing in his ears until at last she fell silent. Her blackened form hung its head, meat dripping from her bones.

“Banewight…” Logan uttered when he was sure she was dead. “What am I to make of that?”

Taran scratched his nose. “Nothing, sir. She had no implements to channel her intentions… It seems she merely wished to waste her final breath attempting to frighten you. A petty revenge.”

“M-my wife…”

He couldn’t finish his sentence. Sieur Aron did it for him. “His wife is with child.”

“The child will be safe. No witch can curse without a circle. They were only words.”

Logan still wasn’t sure. He wasn’t a specialist in the subject, and Taran was, yet his doubts lingered. If it was true, he’d find out the hard way. The only way forward from there would be to salvage his honor and take his life.

Taran took a firm grip of his shoulder. “My business is concluded here. I will ride to Witchfall Keep and speak with the grand inquisitor. If he informs me that it’s even slightly possible for Laetitia’s curse to have taken hold, I’ll send a falcon.”

“And if she is cursed…my child…” Logan continued.

The Banewight’s lips thinned into a line. “Then either smother the girl before she cries, or rupture your ears.”

Stunned into silence, Logan watched the Banewight take his leave.

Sieur Aron cleared his throat. “Banewights. They’re a tactless lot. Are you well, Logan?”

Logan nodded, though he wasn’t.

“Perhaps you’d best head on home. Go be with Petra until your spirits have recovered.”

“Yes,” agreed Logan, unsure how a man was supposed to recover from any of this.

He broke away, heading downhill from the town square and straight to his home.

A different scent filled the air here—a pleasant aroma of roasted herbs and vegetables.

He heard the door open and shut at the back of the house as Petra Chastain made her way out and began pinning their clothes to a line.

She sang to herself with blissful disregard; the windows were shut, and the walls were made from thick timber. Bless her, she hadn’t heard a thing.

Logan dropped behind the fence and listened to her song, his arms curling around his knees. He sat for some time before he was noticed, to his wife’s great alarm. She looked down from over the fence, raising a brow in curiosity. “Logan, darling?”

He shut his eyes. “Please keep singing.”

“Is something the matter?”

Logan thought of the curse, of what it could mean for the baby. What it would mean for him. His face pinched. “I just want to hear your voice.”

Petra raised an inquisitive brow, then came around the fence and sat beside him before she sang again.

Her folk song was hopeful and lovely, the words an ancient language still spoken in pockets of Gallae.

Logan listened and rested his head on his wife’s shoulder, hoping to memorize her sound so that he had something to remember if the worst came to pass.