

And if there was a thing that I hate, it's high expectation. Reading a book that my friends praised over and over will make a high expectation.


I just realize when it comes to a book that have so many raving reviews, I always read it too late. Two people brought together by the trappings of duty and politics will discover they are destined for each other, even as the powers of a hostile kingdom scheme to tear them apart. Bound to her new husband, Ildiko will leave behind all she’s known to embrace a man shrouded in darkness but with a soul forged by light. Resigned to her fate, she is horrified to learn that her intended groom isn’t just a foreign aristocrat but the younger prince of a people neither familiar nor human. Ildiko, niece of the Gauri king, has always known her only worth to the royal family lay in a strategic marriage. Always a dutiful son, Brishen agrees to the marriage and discovers his bride is as ugly as he expected and more beautiful than he could have imagined. A trade and political alliance between the human kingdom of Gaur and the Kai kingdom of Bast-Haradis requires that he marry a Gauri woman to seal the treaty. Brishen Khaskem, prince of the Kai, has lived content as the nonessential spare heir to a throne secured many times over.
