Tims Caulder knew nothing of the world beyond the brothel that raised him and the women his master employed. A single act of bravery thrusts him into a life he never imagined. As a man, he will do anything for the one who showed it to him. The noble lords despise him, calling him the King’s pet. They have no idea what he truly is. When destiny places him directly in the path of an ancient prophecy, the truth will prove far more dangerous than any lord’s scorn.

Princess Averin loved Tims from the moment she first saw his heart and fell for much more as the years passed. It’s a love she will never speak aloud, least of all to him. As the only child of King Joshua, she is dismissed as weak and unfit to inherit Calmone’s throne. Yet her survival is the one thing keeping the realm from a bloody war for the crown. More than one blade is already drawn with her name on it.

On a dark, foreboding morning, a lone figure approaches the capital city of Sarsda, looking more like a demon than a man. He has traveled the length of the known world to deliver a single message to the King. Its contents could incite the White Council of wizards to dethrone a monarch.

In the borderlands between Calmone and the Free Territories, where mercenaries thrive and law is a memory, a broken woman works a seedy tavern catering to hardened men. She has but one question: why were her parents murdered by those who wield magic? When a stranger presses a note of thanks into her hand bearing a strange emblem, her search for answers begins, leading her into a world hidden from all the races of man.

Three hundred years ago, a prophecy was given as a warning to the human races. The Ancients, born of the lifeblood of magic, have watched for a thousand years as man corrupted their lands and themselves. Now, as another unicorn dies, the first law of the Ancients will be broken: they will speak of war against humanity. And within the Pentarch, the highest order of the White Council, listen to the gods who betrayed their own kind.

Secrets run deep, but truth will shatter the world. A forgotten war is rising, and it will bleed the lands of the fae…and beyond.