The faithless hawk

Fie, now a Crow Chief taking over Pa's band, thought that delivering the Saboran crown prince safely to his allies would fulfill the covenant and secure the Crows' safety from corrupt Queen Rhusana and the vigilante White Oleanders. But it seems the queen has blamed the Crows for her husband's death, and Fie and the Crows are now in more danger than ever. Fie learns that the only road to safety for her people is for her to reclaim the Crow birthright--something she never realized they had lost. Trusted partners switch sides, and she has only a handful of faithful helpers--including the crown prince--so how can Fie ever hope to win? Owen's fledgling chief and her Crow family stay on the move in this action-oriented sequel to The Merciful Crow (2019), and the tension only escalates as the story advances. The addition of the birthright plotline adds another dimension to the mystical aspects of the tale, and swift and unexpected turns propel it forward breathlessly.

Plague and power struggles continue to ravage a kingdom in this sequel to 2019's The Merciful Crow. Unlike the 11 other bird-named castes of Sabor, only the Crows can handle the Sinner's Plague victims, dispatching fatal "mercy," handling corpses, and taking teeth as payment, yet they are reviled. Fierce young Fie, now a chieftain, and her Crows already delivered Prince Jasimir to safety once, but their promised protection--from daily abuse and nighttime Oleander Gentry raids--is threatened again by Queen Rhusana's ruthless rise to power. When Rhusana interrupts Fie's too-brief reunion with Jasimir and Tavin (his half brother, a royal bastard, and Fie's love interest) via gruesome zombielike skin-ghasts and new mind-control magic, Fie goes solo. Familiar with death, decay, and discrimination, Fie is a refreshingly earthy and grimly determined protagonist with borrowed powers but innate pugnaciousness; romance clashes with her self-reliance. In a world where the dead gods may be reincarnated and every caste has witches and Birthrights, inequality and prejudices nevertheless fester, albeit along caste and class lines (rather than explicitly racial ones). If the first installment was a hair-raising road-trip/hardscrabble survival tale, this one is a proper court intrigue laced with looming social revolution, cryptic religious prophecies, and a fair amount of gore. Owen also raises the stakes, forcing self-reliant Fie to save all Sabor in order to protect all Crows, not just her band, while sustaining the suspense and adventure. A richly textured story of rage, romance, and rebellion. (Fantasy. 14-18) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.