First Lines Friday №61 | A Book Feature

A land ravaged by storms and conquerors…
A refuge across the sea that comes at a price…
A volatile alliance between two bitter enemies…
A growing attraction as dangerous as it is irresistible…

On opposite sides of a vicious war, a soldier who can channel light magic and a prince who summons shadows find themselves locked in a deadly dance that neither can seem to truly win. As the Continent falls to howling winds and violent lightning brought on by a ruthless emperor’s fleet of stormships, the only way for Talasyn to save countless lives is to reclaim her birthright in a mysterious archipelago over the Eversea—and to enter into a fraught political marriage with Prince Alaric, the very man she had sworn to destroy.

Like Talasyn, Alaric makes no secret of his displeasure with such an arrangement. But, when a new threat emerges to shatter a fragile peace, necessity forces the reluctant couple to work together while wrestling with the inconvenient but undeniable bloom of desire amidst a backdrop of secrets and cutthroat political intrigue.

What would you do to win a war? What would you do to save all that you hold dear? And what do you do when the person you hate finds their way into your heart, beneath the rising tempests?