All her life, Vaasa KozƔr has been sharpened into a blade.
After losing her motherāher only remaining parentāto a mysterious dark magic that has since awakened within her, Vaasa is certain death looms. So is her merciless brother, who aims to eliminate Vaasa as a threat to his crown. In one last political scheme, he marries her off to Reid of Mireh, a ruthless foreign ruler, in hopes that he can use her death as a rallying cry to finally invade Reidās nation. All Vaasa has to do is die.
But she is desperate to live. Vaasa enters her new marriage with every intent to escape it, wielding the hard-won political prowess and combat abilities her late father instilled in her. But to her surprise, Reid offers her a deal: help him win the votes to rise in power, and she can walk free. In exchange, she will share his knowledge about the dark magic running through her veinsāand help keep it at bay.
This proposal may be too good to refuse, yet Vaasa and Reidās undeniable attraction threatens to break the rules of their arrangement. As her brotherās lethal machinations take form, everything is at stake: Vaasa must learn to trust her new husband, but how can she especially when their perfect political marriage begins to feel like the real thing? In The Serpent and the Wolf, Vaasa and Reid must confront deadly betrayals, unravel the enigma of her dark magic, and decide whether their growing bond is their greatest strengthāor the ultimate riskāin a world where love and power are the most dangerous games of all.
Why You Should Read This Book
Tropes
Trigger Warnings
The Serpent and the Wolf
āJust because this is all you have ever known, it does not mean it is all you will ever be.ā
āThis is my line, Vaasalisa. Do not threaten my country.ā
āYou are my wife, and everything begins and ends with that.ā
āI believe you said a powerful man who has drunk wine all night and watched strangers dance with his wife will want her in his bed.
āYou can inherit someoneās eyes, or their hair or their nose, but you cannot inherit their faults. You learn them. Which means you can unlearn them, too.ā
āFor you, Vaasa. She thought if you were brave enough to be here, she should be, too.ā
āPick one you love. For if you donāt love it, it will mean nothing to you, and it must mean something to you.ā
āI have waited a lifetime to watch it. To see each speck of fear dance in your eyes as you come to terms with your greatest nightmare, for you have found every way to witness mine.ā
āI wanted my wife to know everything she needs to in order to lead confidently at my side.ā
āThis has nothing to do with how much Iād like to have you in my bed, though I do hope youāll find interest in that, too, Wild One.ā
āThen let me make you an empress. Tonight.ā
āI have learned that home is seldom a place; it is people, the most unexpected of them, that give us roots.ā
āI know you donāt want a nation or a throne, I know you donāt want this life. So if I have to wait until the end of this decade, I will. I will find you and then you can choose what life we live. Any life you want.ā
āI propose the following: You act as my wife for a time, and I will help you discover all you wish to know about Veragi magic.ā
āThen itās one less thing weāll have to argue about. Marital spats are no fun, or so Iāve heard. Not that my wife has been around long enough for me to discover their level of joy.ā
āBeing the ruler of anything is a corrupting job, and no man walks out of it the same as when he walked into it. If you value anything about yourself, which I gather you do, given the seeming resilience of your ego, youāll settle for being a councilor and mind your own.ā
āThe choices of others are not a burden I carry any longer, and neither is their shame.ā
āYou call it anger, you call it fear, but it is none of those things. What lies inside of you is pain. The kind that burns worlds to the ground.ā
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