Book Review: Born of Blood and Ash

Title: Born of Blood and Ash
Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout
Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Romantasy

What It’s About: Nyktos does not want to leave Seraphena alone in the bedroom, but knows that he can take a few minutes to speak with Nektas, who in turn tells him that everything is quiet and asks Nyktos if he will wreck him like he had threatened a few hours ago. Nyktos tells him no, and then asks for more time for them to have together so that Seraphena could take time to heal, though he knows that they do not have time. He returns to the bedroom, and settles in bed next to Seraphena, who in turn seems to be in the midst of a nightmare. At one point, she screams no, and he shakes her awake, using compulsion, because he cannot stand to see the sight of her squirming in her dreams. When she wakes up, they talk some, though Seraphena avoids talking about Kolis in any way, because she thinks that what she went through is nothing. And Ash, he wants to know what was done, because he wants to hurt Kolis for everything that he’s done to Sera. As Ash is going to find some food, a white mist shows up and Ash is ready to obliterate it, only for Sera to push him when her senses tell her that it’s ancient.

Suddenly, she finds herself in a cavern with the three horsemen—war, pestilence and famine—and they tell her to prove herself, while one of them throws a sword. When she realizes that she has no choice but to go through with it, and picks up the sword, a draken-like monster shows up with three heads. She cuts off one head, only to realize that it grows back. After assessing the monster, she realizes that she has to cut off the middle head, and when she does, the monster dies, but then changes into Tavius—her step brother. Losing herself in the midst of anger at what she promised she would do to him when she saw him—if she saw him again—Seraphena chops off his hands and then stops. She realizes that she can’t go through with killing Tavius, because it will the permanent kind of death, even though she really wants to end him. She tells the three horsemen that she cannot go through with it, and they find her worthy; telling her that she did harm him, but did not kill him, so she is found worthy and they will come when she calls. She realizes that the ordeal was about her facing her own inner monster. She walks through the cavern and the hallways, until she suddenly finds herself on the balcony again, and finds Nektas landing in his draken form on the balcony, before shifting. He tells her that Eythos went through the same thing himself as the Primal of Life, but his trial was different. He also adds that everyone in the palace is asleep under a spell, and that they would only wake with the daytime. So Seraphena waits by Ash, and when he wakes up, he is in full Primal mode—she tells him that she’s fine, but they end up having sex several times. They barely leave the room, though they do talk about Kolis and formulate a plan on what to do with him: entomb him.

When the day comes to meet with everyone, Ash has to take care of some things on his own, and Aios comes in to keep Sera company. She thanks Sera for saving her life—though Sera apologizes, saying that she wasn’t sure if Aios was happy and healthy. Aios tells her what happened; how Kyn had seen her when she went out to help save others, and made a beeline for her, only to take her to the pikes, and that Ector tried to stop him, only to be hacked to pieces by Kyn. Sera makes an oath to Aios that Kyn will suffer for what he has done to her, Ector, Orphine and the shadowlands. Aios accepts the oath, and tells her that she knows what it’s like to be in the cages, and that it’s not nothing; that when Sera is ready, she is here for her to talk. Ash comes to her later and tells her that she does not have to do this; does not have to meet with them at all today if she’s not ready. But Sera tells him that she’s going through with it, and he does not have to protect her, though she finds it thoughtful.

They go to a room, where Saion, Theron, Lilith, Rhahar, and many others are; they all go down on their knees, with their fist on their chest, and their palm on the floor. Sera tells them to stop doing this, and Ash tells her that they will do that for her because she’s the Primal of Life and that he told them not to do it for him. He tells her that she can tell them to rise and then command them to not do this again. So after a while, she does tell them to rise, forgetting a couple of times to say so, and then commands them to not do it again. They all sit around the table, and get caught up on everything, and then Ash presents their whole proposal around Kolis, including calling the Primals and telling them what is going on. People at the table debate but they ultimately agree to follow this plan, because Sera does not want to be like Kolis though she could take over different courts if she wanted to. Ash tells her that he will go to Attes to have Attes deliver the summons, and Lilith agrees to go with him to make them both behave since Sera is a brand new primal and is much more likely to go down for the count easily than Ash or Lilith. Rhain also brings up the point that a lot of people have come from various courts—escaping from them even—to see Sera, and it would benefit them a lot if Sera and Ash showed up and gave a speech to them to calm these people, telling them that they are welcome. They decide to do that speech the next day, and then Ash would go visit Attes the following day.

Eventually, they visit the valley where the Blood River used to flow because Sera asked about how many soldiers they have, so Ash shows her along with Rhain and Saion. The soldiers notice her and they all go down on their knees, so she waves to them when Ash explains that she can do that, to release them from their kneeling position, and then they go back to practicing.

The night before their meeting with the people of Lethe and the new arrivals, Sera has this feeling that she has to do something—part of the vadentia that she has inherited as the Primal of Life. So she and Ash ride out towards a dry river bed, and she tries to bring back the water. At first, she wishes for the water, but then Ash reminds her that when she freed them both, she did more than that—she willed it. So Sera wills the water to come back, and sure enough, there are spurts of water everywhere—the riverbed refills, and the earth grows back the grass where it previously had been dead. That night she dreams of Kolis, and when she has a moment to herself the next day, she feels something snapping taut, and senses Kolis who has awakened from Stasis now. Sera tells Ash this, and when he asks her if she would have changed anything, she says that she wouldn’t have.

Sera and Ash hold their meeting in the City Hall, with a very grand entrance, where Nektas lands and curls around them in his Draken form while they’re on the dais. Sera decides that she wants to be closer to the people—all of whom had come here to see her, and are looking at her in adoration and admiration, which surprises her—when speaking to them. The two of them tells the crowd that they are all welcome, and that they are working on making things happen for them—homes and food, but there may be some tough times ahead. They then explain that they do not want the realm to be ruled by one Queen, but rather by a council of Primals so that everyone can move from Court freely. Everyone cheers and when Sera and Ash kiss, the cheers get louder.

The following day, Sera barely is eating food in Ash’s office while she tries to practice calling items to her—glass and paper, using primal energy to bring it towards her. Suddenly, an ancient being comes through a portal, and Sera recognizes him as one of the Ancient, but tells Ash that he’s an Arae. The man tells them that the Primal of Life has been summoned by the Primal of Death, the true Primal of Death. Ash goes into protection mode, and wants to take off the Ancient’s head for even putting Seraphena in this position, knowing that Kolis is just wasting their time, and what she’s been through with Kolis. The Arae tells him that he’s here to do the request, and he has to carry it out—there is no way out of it—it has to be done. The man also adds that Ash knows this; that there is no way around it, and that as long as the Arae is there, it will be civil; but that if Ash so much as tries to strike against him, he isn’t from any Court and could easily be destroyed. Sera tries to reason with Ash, but it is only when Nektas appears and tells Aydun (the Arae) that he should know better than to mess around with those who have the heart mate mark, as they are protective of each other. Nektas gets Ash to get level, and then they talk. Afterwards, Nektas takes Aydun out of the office when Ash asks to speak with Sera. They do talk, and he tells her that he knows that she’s suffered under Kolis—that she screams in her nightmares, specifically with the word “no” and that he knows Kolis’s brand of cruelty. He wants her to stay but knows that she has to go, so he tells her to not let Kolis get under her skin, but to tell him to go fuck himself. They end up having sex, and once they are finished, Aydun takes her to Dalos.

In Dalos, Aydun stops her and tells her that Holland told him that she is very aggressively strong-willed and opinionated, but that he was surprised when out of the two of them—Ash and her—she was the most levelheaded and logical. He then tells her that she needs to trust her own gut instinct on things; not the vadentia, but her own actual instincts, and explains that he has seen various threads of fate be snuffed out and the outcome of things changed by her decisions and her actions. So he tells her to trust her instincts again, before they head into Dalos to get things over with. When Sera sees Callum, she kills him, and then continues to walk onwards without waiting to be taken to the meeting place with Kolis. She finds herself in the throne room, with some gods and godlings, but it is Kyn that comes up to her and starts taunting her about all the things that he would do to her when Kolis hands her over to him. Eventually, Aydun puts him in time out, when Kyn riles Sera up too much—because there is an agreement that they will not be harming one another in this meeting. Kolis shows up and sends everyone off, before talking to her, and giving her a deal. Aydun tells Sera that she has to give him a deal back, which makes her panic, but she thinks of one and gives Kolis the terms of her deal. Neither accepts the deal or rejects it right away, and Aydun returns her to the Shadowlands, asking her if taking the deal felt right to her instincts, to which Sera says that it did not.

Ash visits Attes to spread the message of reaching out to the Primals, and Sera is left alone in the shadowlands. She decides to summon Holland to ask about the prophecy because something that Kolis had said to her seemed off. Unfortunately, Penellaphe and Vikter come to her instead as Holland did not want to answer so as to give the appearance of favoritism. Penellaphe tells her that Kolis has the prophecy in the wrong order, and while there is a third part, she is not privy to it—but those who know of the ancients might know it. They continue discussing things and something bugs Seraphena enough that she excuses herself, and feeling that Ash is in danger—as he is now a Primal of no Court—she shadowsteps to Ash directly in Vathi, right in front of Rhahar. At first, Ash and Attes think that she’s crazy but then they are attacked by nynakos—hounds owned by Kyn. They fight them off, and Sera uses her power to obliterate them, which Ash finds sexy enough to take her back to the shadowlands and fuck her.

Attes visits with Thierren, one of the Dream Walkers, and Thierren explains that he figured out what Lailah and Attes were up to and decided to tag along. Attes then asks about the deal with Kolis and Sera and Ash find out that they’ve now entered a stage of no action—eirini—where she cannot take any action, even calling the Primals to her to talk about what she is offering, while Kolis can do that as it does not apply to him because he was the first to offer a deal. Suddenly, Kyn shows up and starts saying some things about them being traitors, and that he can’t wait till Kolis gives her to him as she’s a whore. Attes tries to get his brother out before it goes any further, but Kyn is not wiling to listen. At Kyn’s words referring to Sera as a whore, Ash snaps, and pummels him close to death without crossing the line into death as that would be seen as breaking the eirini. Sera and Ash visit Keella after that, and Keella gives them the full prophecy in written format. She also explains how the Ancients were entombed and where to find such locations—most of which are in the Mortal Realms. When they return with that news, Attes offers to get some of his men to help out Ash’s men in finding a location. Sera walks out with him and tells Attes that she is not going to do anything while in the eirini, but adds that she has made an oath that Kyn will have to suffer for what he did to the people of the shadowlands. Attes states that he understands.

A different day, Ash is called to the Pillars, and Sera is left with Jadis and Reaver. She untangles Jadis’s hair, and then she feels a Primal but it’s neither Attes nor Ash. So she rushes out with Rhain and Rhahar by her side, and when she sees Veses, she jumps down from the wall, and tells her to go away though Veses claims that she’s here to see Nyktos. Sera tells her that she’s no longer welcome here, and that she needs to get out, but Veses is not willing to go a way—a fight ensues in which Sera sends Veses flying, ripping out her hair, and also tearing out her throat. Veses tells her that she came her to speak to Nyktos to convince him to convince Sera to take Kolis’s deal, as things will get bad for them if they do not. She also taunts Sera about being Kolis’s whore, referring to a deal she made for Rhain. Afterwards, Rhain takes her aside and tells her that he hasn’t spoken of the deal, but it hasn’t taken him much to figure out what it was—Kolis wanted to sleep with her. Sera tells him that he only wanted to share the same bed, but nothing more, and he tells her to tell Ash before he hears it from anyone else, as this way she can control the narrative. Sera disregards this advice later when Ash comes back, after she’s finished vomiting up Veses’s blood. They do talk though about what happened and what she did.

Sera is on her way to see Ash one morning, when she runs into Bele and Aios. Bele tells her that she looks like death, and Aios tells her that she looks like she didn’t sleep well. There is some bickering between the two women, and Bele reads Sera’s soul, something that she can do as she is the Primal of her court. Once Sera feels better, and after explaining her symptoms to the ladies, Aios smiles at her as if she wants to say something but is holding back. Sera goes to see Ash, who tells her that she’s not looking well either, but she chalks it up to just being tired from being a new Primal. They do eventually get into an argument because she knows he’s been feeding from someone else—Rhain—and not her, but he’s doing it because he sees her freezing up any time that his fangs get close to her, and he wants to talk about it. But Sera does not want to talk about what happened with Kolis and instead, she turns into a cave cat, and then runs through Iliseum. Ash follows her in his wolf form and when Sera is close to the border to the mortal lands, where she could part the mist and walk through, he calls her back to him and asks her to come back to him. She returns to her human form and he takes her home.

They go visit Keella, and Keella bows to her even though Sera tells her it’s not necessary. They speak about the prophecy, asking her about it because Penellaphe had said that Kolis had it wrong. Keella doesn’t want to speak it out loud, so she writes the prophecy on the piece of paper, and they realize that Kolis did indeed have it wrong. They find out other things as well about Kolis, Eythos and so on, which has them wondering what that means. The three of them try to figure out what the prophecy means, but they get stumped when it comes to the first and second daughters, as it doesn’t make any sense to them. Sera makes the decision afterwards that she wants to give Sotoria a chance to choose things for herself, and to live her life—she’s not willing to use her as a pawn against Kolis, because she has suffered enough. When she tells this to Attes, he is grateful to her; showing that he was in love with Sotoria, but couldn’t do much about it to save her because of Kolis’s obsession.

Sera and Nektas go to Lasania to speak with Ezra about what will be happening so that they can be forewarned that things might impact the mortal lands. While they walk through the castle, they encounter two guards who stop them, but when they see who Sera is by her eyes, they back off. She ends up healing one of the guards who has been dealing with some disease, and he profusely thanks her for helping out; he had been praying but hadn’t found any answer to his illness. She tells him to live a good life. Sera and Nektas then go into the throne room, where they find Callum eating at the table with Ezra, Marion, Marion’s parents, and Sera’s mother. Sera kills him again, freaking everyone out, and because of her heightened emotions, Nyktos shows up. He tells everyone to bow, and specifically tells Sera’s mother that she needs to bow and remember that the child she had ignored, is the Queen of Gods, and Primal of Life. He kisses her and tells her he loves her in front of everyone, before he takes Callum with him to the ‘guest accommodations.’ Sera tells everyone that they may rise, and she speaks with Ezra about Nyktos and the fact that he loves her, and Ezra calls her “sister.” Afterwards Sera’s mother asks to speak with her, and tells her that she’s sorry for not being a more present mother. Sera asks about her name and that she named her after the Queen of the Vodina Islands, which her mom did not expect her to know. They agree to speak at a later time again, this time more about her father.

They talk to Callum, who reveals nothing about why he was visiting Sera’s family, beyond telling her that he liked her mother’s company because she did not expect to speak and was content to sit in silence. He promises that this was the last time he would see them, and they release him afterwards in order to not break the erini.

Ash is called away to the Pillars to deal with a massive amount of Souls coming through to the Pillars that need to be judged, and Seraphena hears a lot of screaming of pain. She realizes that it’s because many are dying or are being killed, and she shadowsteps herself into the mortal world, where she finds death everywhere in Lasania. She comes across her own family—also dead, and loses her grip on her emotion. When she encounters Kyn and Embris, she is so filled with rage that while Kyn escapes, she follows Embris to a different part of the mortal world and kills him, releasing his energy, which wrecks havoc on the world. As part of her rage, she realizes that she’s killed a village, and turns back from her revenge, resurrecting them. She apologizes to them and tells them that they should run; that she will fix the rest of it. She returns to Lasania, where she is about to reach out to return Marisol, Ezra and her mother back to life, when Holland shows up and tells her to Ascend another Primal because Embris’s eather is wrecking havoc on the world. They go to Embris’s court, and Sera asks Penellaphe to Ascend, which she agrees to. Holland takes her away to safety, before warning Sera that worse things are coming.

She finds herself face to face with Kolis, who makes a whole bunch of men jump off of Mount Lotho—where the dream walkers live, leaving Thierran to be the last of them. They fight, but Sera finds herself outmatched by Kolis, who wants her to yield to him as the King of the Gods and give up her claim to the throne, which she refuses. Kolis only leaves her alone when Vikter shows up and stabs him from behind with a blade, forcing Kolis to hide in order to heal. Sera returns to the Shadowlands, and she turns into a Cave Cat in front of Nektas and a lot of the other members of her court. Nektas keeps her from running, and stays by her side for all of the time that it takes Nyktos to return from the Pillars—which is a few days. When Ash returns, he has her come out of her nota form, and they talk. Ultimately, Sera breaks down and tells Ash everything about her treatment under Kolis as well as her treatment with Tavius, her stepbrother.

As the erini is broken by Kolis who had grown bored of waiting, they call all of the Primals to meet them. In the morning, Sera realizes that she had an image of a cave cat with two cubs when she was asleep and healing from her ascension. She wonders if she is pregnant, but says nothing, as she will need to confirm that with someone. They call the Primals, hold court, and she tells them that she wants to give them a choice to be part of the council to make things better. Sera dismisses Veses, and she also tells Kyn that he will die, just not now. This prompts Phanos to say that she doesn’t seem all that different than Kolis, but ultimately he decides to stay on his islands alone and not be involved unless he has to. Saion, who comes from Phanos’s Court, only chuckles and tells him that he obviously doesn’t care and hasn’t changed—as long as he can go without being involved, the better. The rest of the group consisting of Attes, Penellaphe, Bele, Keella, and Maia, decide to pledge themselves to Sera and Nyktos. There is only one problem: Keella is unable to pledge herself to them because when she helped Eythos with Sotoria, the Fates decided that the fair and balanced thing for her involvement would be for her to be required to serve Kolis. She tells them that this only applies to her and not her court, and that it will be time for her to enter Arcadia.

Sera takes a break from the group and finds Aios, with whom she speaks in confidence about what she thinks is going on. Aios checks her by touching her stomach and confirms that Sera is indeed pregnant, with two babes. At first Sera doesn’t know what they will do, because she hasn’t spoken with Nyktos about it. Aios mentions terminating the pregnancy if needed, but Sera already loves the children and is not willing to terminate it. Sera finds her way down to the bath, and finds herself basically underwater to help calm her thoughts. Ash finds her like that and at first is upset because she is in her gown and for anyone looking down into the pool, it looked like she may have drowned herself. Sera assures him that it is not the case, and then she tells him the truth—she is pregnant. This stuns Ash into silence, and he doesn’t say anything for a while, which has Sera telling him that she’s pregnant with twins. This further shocks him, and he remains silent. When Sera prompts him to say something about this, and whether he’s okay with them having children, he is emotional, and tells her that he’s never even given himself the chance to hope that this was possible, but that he’s happy. Everyone is confused as to how she conceived as she was a human when she conceived, and Ash is horrified to learn that he would have lost not only Sera but his own children if he hadn’t ascended her. Their best guess is that between the embers and his blood, she was on her way to becoming a god or primal and that made it possible for them. They end up having sex in the bath.

The next day, they have the healer check her over, and he tells them that she seems to be fine, but that she’s the first Primal to have children in a very long time, so they don’t know much about primal pregnancies, and he asks to leave to research more. He does tell them that her first two trimesters (having just found out that she’s about to enter her second one) should be similar to any god’s pregnancies, but the third trimester is what they do not know about. He adds that she will need to take care of herself, and Nyktos will need to feed from someone else as her eather will be used to develop and grow their babies. Afterwards, Sera tells Aios that they are keeping the kids, but asks her to keep it to herself—they had decided on this in order to ensure that this pregnancy isn’t used against them. Afterwards, they go to Keella’s court, and Sera and Keella talk a bit, about the pregnancy and other items, before Sera drinks Keella’s blood—releasing her to go into Arcadia, and ascends Ione in Keella’s stead, who in turn pledges herself to them both.

They visit Veses, fighting their way through the halls together, killing godlings and gods to get to Veses’s bedroom. There, a fight ensues between Sera and Veses, while Ash stays out of it, telling her that he had considered Veses a friends. At some point, Veses is down for the count, and she tells Sera that she won’t do anything to her, believing (mistakenly) that Sera will not kill because of how she had said that she wanted to be different than Kolis. Sera tells her that she will kill her and that she will take her power into herself, not ascending anyone in Veses’ stead, and that Veses is not going to go to Arcadia—she will simply be forgotten. Once Veses is dealt with, they bring in some of their men, and they find out the levels of depravity of the court—Veses had any god or goddess dumped into mass graves (an insult in their customs) for any reason at all, including minor infractions. Sera asks Kara and some of the others to make sure that the individuals in the mass graves get the proper burial.

Sera ascends Saion in preparation of having to kill Phanos, for not joining them in the beginning. Then, Sera and Ash head to the Callasta Isles with Nektas, in order to speak with Phanos. Except, the place is deserted, and Phanos is nowhere to be found along with his armies and navy—it seems like he must have left with his forces from the isles because of Kolis. So they send Nektas off to check if he can see where the forces went, while they head back to the Shadowlands. As they are shadowstepping back, Sera senses something wrong through her connections, and though she does not know where it is happening, she is able to follow it, and they find themselves on the battlefield where brother is fighting brother—Kyn has waged war on Attes. They fight side by side trying to make their way to Attes, because he cannot be allowed to fall, but ultimately Attes gets the upper hand on Kyn, and tells Sera to go back to the shadowlands and ascend Lailah (as they had agreed, so that she can take Kyn’s place). She leaves with Ash, and Attes kills Kyn, his own brother, which is something that weighs on him going forward. In the midst of it all, Maia falls as Phanos had attacked her Court. Sera ascends Aios in Maia’s place, since Aios is from the same Court. Both Lailah and Aios rest in the Shadowlands.

Sera calls one of the Fates, in front of Ash and Attes one day after the three of them chatting. The Fate that answers is Holland, surprising her. They talk and he does share some items with her about her training, the Fates themselves, and Sotoria and her bloodline—that she is the second daughter of the third human created by Eythos, and that bloodline is the Mierel bloodline, which is Sera’s own bloodline, and no one from the Mierel bloodline has ever hungered for power. Sera realizes that she will never be able to have him over for dinner even though he’s a father figure—the only one in her life—because of the rules. She asks him to tell Kolis to meet them at the Bonelands in exchange for the Star containing Sotoria’s soul, and she wants it without the Fates mediating. It takes a few days, but Kolis agrees to meet—at a Sun Temple, which apparently Ash knows the location of. They debate the location amongst themselves, and Lailah is indignant that she can’t go with them because she is the best fighter, to which Sera explains to her why they need her to stay behind—that she is still newly ascended and it means that she will endanger others by having them worry about her while they’re on the field. Ultimately, they make a plan on how their groups will be spread out throughout the area in order to defend against Kolis and his forces, since they know that Kolis will not be coming alone.

On the day of, they wait at the Temple, and as expected, Phanos’s army shows up—so they have the draken burn the ships, and the different contingents of their own forces start fighting against Kolis’s. At some point Sera and Ash are pulled into the battle because the Revenants come after them, but they manages to fight them off, and incapacitate them. Callum even shows up, and when Sera pushes him off the ledge, he disappears. At some point, Kolis shows up on top of Naberius, and they talk, but he flies off on top of the draken. Eventually, they find him entering the Temple, and follow him. Sera and Ash take a beating from Kolis and Varus—one of the previously entombed gods—and Attes comes to their help, when Kolis reveals that Sera is pregnant with twins because he can see their souls and that Phanos had died. But they manage to knock out Kolis with help from Thierran, and they take Kolis to Oak Ambler, where Attes, Ash and Sera entomb him. Sera gives Ash the spear from Attes, giving him the honor of stopping Kolis after everything that he has done to Ash over the years. Suddenly, Sera gets the feeling that they have to go to Sotoria in that moment, though Ash tries to convince her that she should get checked out. But she’s adamant, so Attes takes them directly to the room where he holds the Star, only to find the Star is gone. Sera calls the Fates again, telling them that she doesn’t care which one answers, and Aydun shows up. He tells them that the Star is beyond their hands, and suggests that they should kill their own children, because it is one of their children’s children that will have the two daughters, including the one who destroys their world and reawakens the Ancients, because she thirst for power. Sera smiles, knowing that he is mistaken because of what Holland had shared.

Two months later, Ash fucks Sera on their breakfast table, and then they go to City Hall to celebrate after two months of mourning. While they’re at the City Hall celebrating, Sera spends time with Reaver and Jadis, but she keeps looking over to Attes. She leaves Reaver with Ash, and Jadis with Nektas, before walking over to Attes, who informs her that he is going into Stasis tomorrow. He then goes to annoy Ash one last time, and they all have a great time.

Nyktos notices his wife—the one who he loves and who always gave him a hard on, but who has given him a raging hard on ever since her belly has gotten larger—hiding behind a pillar when she should be on bed rest. He calls her over, and she tells him that she can’t be resting any more because her mind wanders thinking of various things. She had been getting lighter when talking about Dalos, as they are rebuilding the Palace there without Kolis’s stench, though it still is hard for them to be there, because it is the seat of her power. They’ve changed the statues so people know that it is a Queen of Gods, not a King of Gods, and rebuilt a lot of different places. They talk about spending time half in Dalos and half in the Shadowlands. Nyktos is proud of her for fighting that darkness that comes with what she survived, when she doesn’t flinch cuddling up to him, though he knows that many nightmares find her—including the past few days making it hard for her to sleep. He decides to take her to see his paintings—something he promised her long ago.

The soul sees things from the Star—having been taken by this blonde haired boy, who hides from the Primals and others in different areas of the lands, watching and waiting. They wander as lands change, countries fall, empires get rebuilt, wolves get two shapes meant to lead mates to each other, and the Primals go to sleep. Centuries pass before the boy confides in a Queen, sharing with her the Star and the soul inside. All of these things have been done, to a greater or lesser degree, for love.

My Thoughts: I love the continuation of Sera’s and Ash’s story, but I’m a little bit disappointed that we do not get to see Sera give birth and learn what became of Jadis; how did she end enslaved in the mortal realm? I feel like there is a lot of missing gaps in the stories between this book, and the The War of Two Queens book in the From Blood and Ash series. I’m still not particularly clear on some elements of the prophecy, which I feel like could have been fleshed out a bit more, though I get the sense that it’s that way for the reason, and I would be better able to put the two together if I read the Fire and Flesh Series first in totality (again) and then shortly thereafter re-read the whole Blood and Ash series, to see the parallels between the two and how that prophecy comes to fruition. Preferably, I would wait to do this exercise until the last book in Blood and Ash series comes out so that I can get the full spectrum of details. I also wasn’t a fan of the last chapter and the ending of this book, from the perspective of the Star.

Still, I loved the growth between Ash and Seraphena, and especially poignant was the scene where Sera reveals to him that she’s pregnant in the pool. You could see how Ash never gave himself a chance to hope, to dream of such a thing because of all the abuse under Kolis, but now he has her and there is that silver of hope that turns into a new life full of things that he would have never experienced up until Sera came around. It’s lovely to watch how he tries to help her through her nightmares and the horrors that Sera went through at Kolis’s hands in Dalos, but it takes her own conversations with Aios and Rhain, and then making her own realizations before Sera is even able to face that shame and be honest with Ash about it.

This is a pretty solid book, overall.