Poppy the Maiden stole a mask and a cloak to go hang out in the local brothel to experience life.  I would probably try a museum, but Poppy’s a little crazy.  It’s fine, she has her knife!

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And holy sh*&, her personal guard, Vikter, strolls in and Poppy promptly looks for a hiding spot. 

 

“Oh ho ho ho, I see you Maiden, go upstairs and hide out in a room, I got you, girl,” says some random lady.  Poppy’s all, thanks, random lady with an unknown agenda! and bops upstairs. 

 

She’s going to just hang out in the spare room until her father-like figure gets his groove on, then bolt back to the castle and hopefully return her stolen goods before any of her completely worthless guards notice she WENT TO A BROTHEL BY HERSELF.

 

Hawke, a handsome royal guard, appears and starts to fondle Poppy, thinking she is the cloak’s actual owner.  Poppy’s surprisingly okay with this as they make out and chitchat about death and Poppy being a liar.  Hawke is called away by Kieran, making Poppy promise to wait for him to return.  She’s all, you bet, buddy.  But she is a liar, sorry, Pops, but you are, and she skedaddles herself back to the castle as soon as he’s gone. 

 

Quick Overview

Poppy is the Maiden, which means she has to wear a mask and try to hide her sass or she’ll be beaten by mean, pale men.  She needs to remain pure because she’s the hope for the realm, blah blah.  Hands off, fellas, she’s going to Oz soon to ascend, which means she’ll become stronger, meaner, and pastier.   

 

Poppy also has the ability to sense how people are feeling and soothe them if they are distressed, a skill she uses to help people since Pops is a decent type of lying kleptomaniac.  Vikter is her personal guard and taught her how to fight, with like every weapon ever, and is very protective of her.  But he’s not great at his job or he would have realized she’s sneaked out to go to a brothel and was fondled by a guard after taking the advice of questionable receptionist AT THE SAME TIME VIKTER WAS THERE.  Not your best work, Vikter.

 

And there are Craven running around freaking everyone out because they are like ghoulish-vampire-zombie type things.  They like to randomly attack the castle, but Poppy’s good with a bow!  Of course she is. 

 

I haven’t listened to this one in maybe a year-ish and tried to kind of refresh myself, but the following is going to be spotty and very likely out of order.

End of Overview

 

Poppy pretty much spends her time at the castle learning weird sh*& from the priestesses, walking the garden, gossiping with Tawny, and being beaten by pasty Ascended a**holes.  She’s supposed to be well-guarded because of her importance, but she’s not.  Gross men beat her with a cane, and she was able to literally walk off the castle grounds by wearing someone else’s coat to go to an establishment where she was quickly fondled, so it doesn’t seem like it’s that high of a priority to protect the savior of the universe. 

 

That all changes, well, no, not really, nevermind, nothing changes after Rylan, one of her personal guards, is murdered in front of her in a kidnapping attempt in the garden.  Jericho, her dim-witted assailant, is all, let’s go, girlie, and Poppy’s all, I have a knife!  Let’s dance!  Yeah, let’s dance!  They try to dance, but Jericho’s called off after being stabbed by Poppy with her beloved knife.  The knife’s backstory is like, ick, please go bury it, but she loves her knife soooo much!  You don’t get to hear about that until, like, the 73rd book in the series. 

 

Anyway, because Rylan was a terrible guard, sorry, dude, you were, but I bet you were a good chef or something, there’s now an opening for a personal guard for the Maiden.  And it’s been filled!  You’ll never guess who!  Yes, Hawke the Fondler!  Poppy starts freaking out because does he recognize her from the Red Pearl?  Sigh, of course he does, but she ponders it for way too long, he finally has to finally tell her, yes, I have a fully functioning brain, of course I know it was you at the Red Pearl!

 

Hawke the Fondler tells the mean, pasty man that Poppy’s scarred face is beautiful, which only means that Poppy will be beaten later, so again, these guards are just absolute crap.  But he’s very dedicated to protecting Poppy from tripping, so he goes everywhere with her.  She won’t talk to him because she doesn’t know yet that yes, his fully functioning brain recognized her from the Red Pearl, but then the Craven attack the castle!  Hawke and Vikter bebop to the rise to protect the castle, leaving Poppy to run down in her slippers and shoot Craven in the face with a bow and arrow. 

 

Hawke finds Poppy at the end of the attack and they tussle – he’s not amused she’s running around the castle like a cocaine chicken.  She finally talks to him and they banter, and this is what sets this one apart from so so many romantasies– their discussions are fun.  It’s not “me fae man, you mate, me respect you autonomy, Tiddly time with me genetic abnormality.” At least it’s fun …in this one…it gets…more “me mate you mate” in the following books in the series.

 

So now they know Hawke has a fully functioning brain so they can stop acting like he doesn’t.  He’s all blah blah blah, I have to protect you, and she’s all blah blah blah, I married my knife, we’re very happy together!  He shadows Poppy everywhere and does nice stuff like threatening a priestess if she hurts Poppy again and reading Tiddlywinking to Poppy in the library. 

 

The rite is coming up, which I think means all the pasty, mean people will celebrate themselves, but it also might highlight the people who will ascend?  Who knows, the point is that Poppy has to look all pretty for the party and Hawke the Fondler will squire her away to, you guessed it, fondle her.  This pisses off Vikter, since it’s yet another reminder that he’s total crap at his job since he allowed Poppy to be happily fondled in the garden.  Hawke tells Vikter to go get some Geritol but does leave so Vikter can escort Poppy back to her room.  Then sh*& all goes sideways at the big, fancy, ball thing for the pasty people.  On a happy note, the Duke’s corpse is displayed with his cane piercing his heart.  But there are also a lot of Dark One groupies running around killing people. 

 

In all the murdering commotion Pops makes it to a room to escape the groupies, only to find herself with Lord Whatshisface who took great delight in helping cane her.  Vikter’s killed, which sends Pops into a rage and she cuts off Lord Whatshisface’s hand then continues to butcher him to death for wayyyy too long.  AND THEN Hawke shows up, because I can’t say this enough, the Maiden’s guards are total crap at their jobs. 

 

Well, it’s not safe in the castle!  They must spirit the Maiden to the capital!  I think it’s the capital, I could look it up, but just not motivated.  Road trip!  Off Poppy, Hawke the Fondler, Kieran, and some other random people that merely exist to be killed on this journey, go!

 

Not much really happens, Rodents of Unusual Size, Blood Forest, eaten guard, etc… Hawke the Fondler does get the chance to put his fondling skills to use to help Pops sleep, so I guess that’s good since he’s crap at protecting her. 

 

Eventually they end up at an inn, and Pops is all, I’m tired of being the Maiden!  Hawke the Fondler, my knife, and I can go open a B&B!  So she’s all down with some Tiddlywinks with The Fondler.  So they Tiddlywink, leading Hawke to tell her that her lower bathing suit area tastes like honeydew.  She should slap him since no one wants to taste like bland mush 80% of the time, but these two are weird so we get to hear about Poppy tasting like bland mush repeatedly. 

 

The following day Poppy’s regular guard is like, this place is weird, you’re not safe, let’s get out of here!  Since he’s the only guard to notice danger around Pops, he’s killed pretty quickly.  Poppy and another guard, maybe? I don't think it's the same guard? might be? make it to a barn after seeing Kieran shift into a wolfy.  The guard dies and Jericho is all, let’s cha-cha, Maiden! as he waves a stumpy arm at her.  Poppy fights for awhile, nearly getting disemboweled, then Hawke the Fondler shows up and Poppy tells him to run!  Hawke says, “It’s fine, mushy bathing suit area,” as he kills another one of her guards.  I think, it’s hazy.  Point is that Hawke the Fondler has planned this whole thing for The Dark One.  The Dark One has been the boogie man to Poppy – all kind of threats like  he’ll kill her, he’ll kidnap her, he killed her parents, he snores, he microwaves salmon…

 

Poppy goes all cocaine chicken on Hawke the Fondler, slapping him around in front of his men.  Being the total crap guard over Poppy’s well-being that he is, Hawke the Fondler has her taken to a cell for safe keeping only to eventually realize she’s badly injured.  Sigh.  Total crap. He puts a band aid on her tummy and blathers on about how she knows nothing, then bebops off leaving her in the care of a mob that wants to kill her. 

 

Said mob does try to kill her and nearly succeeds despite Delano and another wolfy asking them to stop.  Kieran hops back into the scene and sees Poppy’s almost dead and is like, oops, our bad.

 

Hawke the Fondler is back and feeds Poppy some of his blood and she starts to writhe around like one of Dracula’s wives.  But Hawke the Fondler is somewhat decent and rejects her Tiddlywinks, which is good because she’s not right in the head.  AND she tastes like bland mush.

 

Once she’s feeling better, Pops stabs Hawke the Fondler in the heart and apologizes, so that was big of her, like dude, you are terrible at keeping her safe, you kind of deserve it.  She pinwheel runs into the woods in an attempt to get away…to somewhere.  She really doesn’t have a plan.

 

Hawke the Fondler catches her, violently bites her, lets her nearly fall on her face, then they Tiddlywink on the cold ground.  This part really annoyed me when I listened to it – her father figure, Vikter, was murdered, along with at least four guards who tried to protect her.  She’s been nearly gutted and has almost bled out because of Hawke the Fondler’s plan.  And she is giggling as she Tiddles him like a one cent pony ride because she doesn’t know what she’s doing.  YOU JUST LOST VIKTER, GIRL, STOP GIGGLING ABOUT HOW TO TIDDLY THE FONDLER RESPONSIBLE AND GET INTO THERAPY.  MAYBE STAB HIM AGAIN.

 

It's all fine now, so back they go to the inn where he announces Poppy is half Atlantian!  Oh, and Hawke the Fondler is actually The Dark One, who is full Atlantian, which means they are the cool vampires, not the pasty ones!  And they’re getting married, b*ches!