Prologue
In the Kingdom of Averaine, a commoner does not bargain with a king unless she intends to take his court with her. When King Leopold pulled Lenora D’Arcy from the town’s narrow streets into his private bed, he believed heavy silk, gold coin, and royal authority would buy her silence. He thought he had found a soft, pliable indulgence to keep behind locked doors. He was wrong.
Installed in sovereign luxury at Valecourt Palace, Lenora steps into a gilded labyrinth of predatory lords, cold dynastic demands, and watching eyes. The court expects an easily managed mistress who can be discarded at will. What they get is a woman who catches the future in sharp, unbidden flashes minutes before the world catches up—a woman who knows precisely how to turn an empire’s hunger against itself.
The king believes he commands her loyalty. But it is General Maximillian Crowe—the crown’s most feared, disciplined battlefield commander—who watches her from the periphery of the throne room. Maximillian does not mistake her calculating ambition for innocence, and he refuses to look away. In corridors governed by rigid propriety and royal command, their sudden, dangerous attraction threatens to shatter every boundary holding the realm together.
Leopold thinks he controls the board. Lenora is already deciding who burns when the crown falls.
Settle in and enjoy this short, explicit story of a powerful woman who seizes control through palace intrigue, dangerous desire, and a consuming attraction that reshapes an empire.
🔥 18+ EXPLICIT CONTENT 🔥A ruthless, decadent Victorian-gothic fantasy romance packed with palace intrigue, dangerous power dynamics, and scorching, explicit heat that never fades to black.
