romantic epic fantasy

Born to privilege. Trained for war. Elivya wants what every noble son takes for granted: strength, respect, and the right to wield a blade. But duty and family have always come first, and the only way to save her House from ruin is to take her place in society. Trained in both wit and warfare, the impetuous young heiress will need every skill in her arsenal to survive King Amenon's Court.

In a world older than time, a portal stirs from its long slumber. From out of its cerulean mists, the warship of the scion of darkness and destroyer of worlds emerges. With its gods long gone, Elati is a world ripe for the taking. Marduk intends to take it all. Corrupted by Marduk's devices, Sethi succumbs to the grip of evil. A brutal, merciless commander, he oppresses the kingdoms of Elati, his violence awakening a weapon of the deepest darkness. Poisoned by lies and tainted by hate, he thirsts for its power to obliterate the light of the one he once loved beyond all reason.

In the epic sequel to The Lost Valor of Love, worlds collide, and gods and mortals cross paths, kingdoms fall, and ancient, long-buried hatreds stir. In the heavens, the storm god Teshub discovers two of the most powerful gods of the pantheon have fallen to a world torn apart by rivalry, war, famine, and plagues. Soon, he learns, he too must fall. In the north, a crown prince ascends the throne, his queen taken by his enemy as compensation for the crimes of his father. But the new king is prepared to risk everything to reclaim his queen, and plans for war begin.

In the centuries-long conflict between the empires of Egypt and Hatti, the young princess Istara is taken hostage by the King of Hatti to secure the loyalty of her father, the King of Kadesh to the empire. Soon her new life in Hatti's glittering capital becomes all she knows. Bound in blood before the gods to Hatti's unwilling crown prince, Istara, now Hatti's queen-in-waiting, learns she will never be loved.