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S. M. Gaither presents Book 5 in the Shadows and Crowns series.

On the eve of her twentieth birthday, Karys woke to the sight of a divine creature dying outside her home. Two weeks later, her sister disappeared, leaving nothing but a trail of blood in her wake. Convinced the gods were responsible, Karys has spent the past five years plotting her revenge with the help of a cutthroat band of likeminded elven rebels. So when Dravyn—one of her world's most powerful deities—descends in search of humans worthy of serving him, Karys knows what she must do.

Death. Betrayal. Destruction. This was Alaya's destiny, written in the stars on the night she was born. She should have been killed because of it. She wasn't. The once crown prince of the highest throne in Sundolia is now the high king, and all of his advisors agree on one thing: He should have destroyed that dangerous Dragon woman when he had the chance. He didn't. Now war spreads like a wildfire from the southern kingdom. The empire is burning. The day of prophecy is arriving.

The kingdoms are shattering. A tyrant rules from the north. The Dragon clan, once exiled beyond the edges of the empire, has joined forces with a bloodthirsty, opportunistic king in the south. And the crown prince of Rooks is running out of options to keep the people and places he loves safe. His best chance to save his world and take the crown from his mad father may lie in the most dangerous of those exiled Dragons-a woman who is just as likely to ruin him as she is to save him.

Decades ago, the High King of Sundolia waged a war that vanquished the Serpent clan and drove them out of the empire. But they did not leave peacefully. Their parting gift included curses that now rest within the empire's soil, growing more and more dormant as the years pass under the rule of that increasingly tyrannical high king. Until Alaya - a young woman with a hidden Serpent mark who shouldn't exist - accidentally wakes one of them up. Then another. She must seek the truth about her lost clan and the so-called curses they left behind. About her true home.

Casia has survived her brother's attempts to crush her and her growing army, but the battle for their empire is just beginning. Bitter and wounded, carrying the curse of a dark and dangerous upper-god, and desperate for more allies, she charges northward to seek the elves who once walked alongside the divine beings. The elven Court of Moreth holds knowledge. Secrets. And power. The kind of power that could shift all of Casia's wars in her favor. If she can survive the dangerous politics and treacherous magic of the elf-kind.

Still reeling from an unimaginable loss and the revelation of an identity she isn't sure she wants to embrace, Casia has one plan: Try to control the strange magic awakening inside of her. Mastering that magic will take her and her friends on a quest through cursed lands, into the dwellings of old gods, and deep into a Southern empire filled with deadly foes and unlikely allies.

Mercenary Casia Greythorne cares about two things: completing whatever her latest job is and earning enough coin to buy the expensive medicine that's keeping her mentor alive. So when the king himself offers her a job, she can't resist the massive reward he offers - even if it means working with Captain Elander, the arrogant, mysterious right-hand to that king. Her partner may be infuriating, but at least their mission seems simple and quick enough: investigate the origins of the strange plague that's been ravaging their empire, help find a cure, and then call it a day.

The highest throne in the Kethran Empire lies vacant, its once-ruler now a god-ascending, bringing more chaos and darkness to an already chaotic world. The line between the divine and mortal realms is blurring. The battlefield is set. A final, devastating war is on the horizon.