Book Review: Dragonhart

Title: Dragonhart
Author: Abbie Eaton
Genre: Romance, Fantasy, Romantasy

What It’s About: Arla Reinhart is training with a guard when the King’s guard arrives and tells her that King Cyrus of Hadalyn wants to speak with her. He had taken her in when she fell underneath his horse while trying to steal the gold buckle, as she was orphaned by an attack from Kastonia on Hadalyn. The regiment had killed her parents while trying to storm into Hadalyn’s Castle Grey, looking for Dragons. Ever since then, Arla has rejected all notions of magic, though people have continued to believe in it. She goes to the throne room to see Cyrus, and finds that the Kastonian Ambassador, Hark Stappen, is there as well. The two of them trade barbs as neither of them get along with one another and Arla doesn’t like what the Kastonians had caused her to lose. Cyrus cuts through and tells them that they are to work on a mission together—one to secure iron that has been going missing. Arla protests, but Cyrus’s word is final. So she goes out on the town to see her best friend, Halos, and get her hair done. She also buys herself a new outfit and on the way back towards the castle, she catches Hark trailing her, though they verbally spar some more.

The two of them head out the next day with Hark taking Vetta, Arla’s horse, and in retaliation, Arla takes Eros, which is Hark’s horse. They continue verbally sparring, but at some point Arla is the only one aware that there are bandits coming up on them. She gives Hark one warning to duck, before sending an arrow into the bandits. A fight breaks out and she is glad that Hark is on top of Vetta when she sends a throwing dagger at the bandit trying to steal the golden buckle of Vetta’s saddle. As they race away from the bandits, Hark is furious with her and why she wouldn’t let him know. They continue their banter as they enter the city of Larkire, where the Palace sits. Hark takes them to the stable and then cuts off one of the stable hands as he is talking to Hark in response to something Arla had shared. They settle in the palace, have dinner with the king and queen, where Arla notices that the King isn’t happy with his queen, Arabelle, and where she meets Prince Ruben. She wanders the halls at night, though Hark follows her to see where she is going and to learn more about her. She also disappears off into the city, to read a book, and Hark finds her before the King is able to, in order to warn her that the King didn’t want her to be out and about. She had already been out in the city before that where she had a conversation with a man who told her about slaves.

Once the weather clears up, Hark and Arla leave to Irelliad, where they check out the port that the King had wanted her to secure. It turns out that the two kings are trafficking in Slaves, something that is prohibited after the war between Hadalyn and Kastonia, and at first Arla tries to explain it away, but Hark tells her that Cyrus knows. They go to another city about two hours away, once Arla agrees to not go to fight and free the slaves recklessly. Hark meets up with his friends—Sebastian, Kase, Jaz, and Jack—while Arla goes out into the bars and starts a fight, where she learns that Hark has been stealing the slaves. She’s furious, and they get into an argument when she returns to her room that night, to which he explains to her that they are all magic wielders and that he is trying to save them. The next day, the two of them meet up with Hark’s group, and Kase and Arla get into a verbal back and forth, which Arla purposefully started because it’s been a while since she had a girl to verbally spar with. She walks out of the meeting room with a flair, leaving to go do things.

Hark and Arla attend the fair because they know that there will be some soldiers coming to try to steal more of the magic wielders, and while they wait, they talk. At some point, Arla sees someone out of her peripherals and the two of them push the woman out of the tent, where the hag explains to them that Arla’s mere presence has already saved many lives because the soldiers will not show up, considering her reputation. As a result, Arla gets drunk, and Hark takes her home to his room to make sure that nothing happens to her. They end up kissing a second time, though Hark stops it from going further as he cannot take advantage of her—the last time they kissed, he had made her come with his fingers. The next morning, the group of them goes to the camp and they get the slaves that they were thinking of getting out. Then Kase comes up to Hark and Arla, and the three of them run away, at which point Arla realizes that she had unknowingly been used as bait by the group. Hark and Arla get into an argument at the bloodstone, which is the meeting point, and he promises her that he’ll get the rest of the slaves out. The group spends the night, and then the next morning they return with the intention of freeing the rest of the slaves. Things go awry when Arla notices a group of kids stuck between two advancing sides of soldiers, and runs after them, only for them to wink out of existence and the soldiers to impale themselves on one another. Hark and his team rally to Arla, but then Hark is on his knees, with a sword swinging at his head. This causes Arla to lose focus and get knocked out unconscious with the hilt of the blade.

Three days later, when she wakes up, she learns that Hark had been taken by the soldiers to the Palace and that he is being kept in his rooms. She doesn’t want to live without him, so even though all his friends say that they’re not going to save him, she tells him that she will, garnering respect from them, including Kase. Arla rides a horse she had stolen in Vorstrum all the way to Hadalyn, while nursing a concussion. She visits her friend, Halos, and admits that magic is real. There, she runs into the hag that she met at the festival, who reminds her that she knows where the magic is located. So once Halos is done with Arla, she heads out to find Brik—the thief that she had threatened before—and this time she asks him to help her get in under the castle. First, she goes up to her rooms, sneaking in, where she is caught by Perry. Perry tells her that it’s not like her to be sneaking in and to be late, but that she doesn’t understand. Cyrus joins them, and there is a discussion to which Arla admits she wouldn’t ever be okay with what they are doing. Cyrus threatens her if she attacks his kingdom, and Arla just leaves, knowing that she is no longer interested in that.

With Brik’s help, she gets to the caves where she found the oddly shaped wall as a child, and realizes that this indeed is a dragon. She speaks to it, and the dragon introduces her to another one called Thara, who will be her guide on the journey that Arla must undertake as the last Dragonhart. He explains a handful of things to her about the Dragonhart line, and then she leaves the caves with Thara at her side, through an entrance she never noticed, though Thara explains that it has been hidden by magic and long forgotten by humans how to find it. They fly towards Kastonia, where Arla tells Thara her plan—Thara is to create a commotion outside, while Arla goes to kill the king if he doesn’t abdicate in favor of his son.

She is able to get into the palace with her weapons, but then Reuben comes out and tells her that she either must fight him or leave her weapons at the door. Arla doesn’t want to fight him, so she drops her weapons at the door, and sweeps into the throne room. The king confirms that he has found a way to stabilize blood with magic in it so that he can later figure out how to get the power into himself. He also reveals that Hark is actually his son, which Arla didn’t know, but which she quickly accepts. When the King is about to backhand his wife for her minor misstep, Arla throws a pin at his hand, pinning it to the throne, tells the Queen that she should seek refuge in Hadalyn, and then uses the ensuing chaos to not only leave the throne room, but also pick up her weapons and go in search of Hark.

Hark had been locked in his room for days, and wants to get out to get to Arla because he worries for her. Suddenly he hears his brother, Reuben on the other side of the door. The two brothers talk with Reuben asking Hark to never forget them because they never forgot him, and then opens up Hark’s door, telling him to go get Arla because he sees how Hark looks at her. Arla in the meantime fights her way through guards, until Reuben shows up and pulls her through a side door. He tells her that his brother is at the other end of the passage way, and disappears. Arla continues on until she gets there and they find each other. Hark and Arla make their way around the castle to find a way out, and at one point Hark offers Arla to get out on the battlements without him as he wants to hold off the soldiers, but she tells him that they go together. They make it on the battlement and they keep fighting, with Arla rallying towards the end to fight with more strength. When they’re at the edge, she jumps with Hark behind her and is caught by none other than Thara.

They fly away and Arla almost falls off. Hark and Arla realize that Arla had been impaled with swords while fighting on the battlements—something she felt but didn’t really register due to the adrenaline—and she falls unconscious due to the amount of blood loss, though she feels like she is dying.

When Arla wakes up she’s in a different place, and the twins who had been her maids in Larkire help her in this new location, which she learns later that is Flambriar. She walks around and encounters Kase, who bows to her with her fist over her heart, and when Arla looks around, she sees that everyone else had done the same. Kase takes her to a room and they talk, though Arla is still sharp with her, and regrets it immediately. But Kase is carrying her own guilt over the whole thing that happened in Larkire Palace and tells Arla that she’s never seen Hark so worried and distraught. Hark eventually shows up and walks her around to show her just what they have built, explaining exactly how it worked and how he made it all happen. In the end, he pleads with Arla to stay with him in Flambriar and rule alongside him, which she agrees to do, but lays out her feelings to him. At first, she thinks that Hark doesn’t feel the same way, but then he tells reveals to her that he has loved her since the day that she stabbed herself with a dagger to prove her loyalty to Cyrus. They then hang out with their friends to eat dinner who reveal that Kastonia had proclaimed Arla as acting on her own and that they had killed her, while saying that Hark has become bewitched by her and hence he disappeared.

My Thoughts: I enjoyed this story of Arla being a disbeliever of magic, and her feelings towards Hark, which over time turn into feelings for him. It liked the verbal sparring that they had along with her arguments with Kase, and Sebastian’s cool surprise. I feel like this is one of those stories where it’s enemies to lovers but with the caveat that they’re a healthy couple who shows what communication is like between them. I guess we will see what kind of story the next book brings and what that will mean for Arla and her dragons.