"If you choose to fight, then you must choose to win." Wyrren Jadis had once been heir to a duchy, and for an afternoon she had been queen of Marla. Now she is an exile and a scholar, living on the charity of Sebastian del Torlo: ruler of Hael Malstrom and her unrequited love. Wyrren doesn’t know why anyone would be able to threaten Sebastian in his own palace, but when she sees a guest attack him during a private meeting without recompense, she’s determined to find out why.

When she was very young, Wyrren’s nannies would tell her how lucky she was to be alive. Stupid little girls like her were usually left to freeze on the Marlan ice. Back then she had lived in a set of rooms in the back of the Renideo fortress, and every so often she would be brought out in her best dress and paraded before her father and mother. Wyrren was to be silent unless she was addressed, to speak carefully when she was called to. Her frozen lips often mangled wo...