The Wolf and the Crown of Blood

This dark fantasy romance, the first in a series, is set in a world divided by the Shroud, a magical barrier separating Vartena, the human realm, from Scillari, the realm of the gods. Three hundred years earlier, Amalthea Devaliant drove a ceremonial blade into her own chest and mingled her blood with that of Alexios, the God of Storms, creating the Shroud and establishing the Accords, a peace treaty requiring regular blood tithes to maintain the barrier. The Devaliant family serves as Anchors, ritually killed and resurrected every 14 days to reinforce the Shroud. While humans forgot the war, the immortal gods, known as Eternals, carried the trauma with perfect clarity.

Two years before the main events, Bryony Devaliant, the youngest princess of the Devaliant royal line and one of the last living Anchors, encounters the Wolf in the Hellevig palace woods. She watches Evander, the God of Light and Alexios' foremost assassin, execute a human who violated the Accords. Despite her terror, Bryony negotiates terms for her own potential death: no decapitation, no trophy-taking, and treatment as an equal. The Wolf agrees and adds uninterrupted eye contact as she dies.

Two years later, the Head Oracle announces that Alexios has revoked Bryony's Claim, the god-bestowed bond protecting her as an Anchor, because citizens worship Bryony instead of tithing. Her wrist now bears an oathbreaker's mark, a death sentence. Bryony stabs herself on the temple grounds as a loophole tithe, arguing the Accords never specified the offering must occur on the altar. Her uncle, Emperor Idris, who has concealed the family's history of suicide and mental health decline, learns of the mark, but Bryony preempts him by revealing it at her arranged wedding, destroying the marriage to protect her older sister Theodora.

The Wolf appears in Bryony's bedroom with a blade at her throat. He offers her a Turpori dagger, forged from the only metal capable of wounding an Eternal, and invites her to cut him before she dies. Bryony slashes into his body in a violent release of suppressed fury. When she reveals her loophole tithe, Evander acknowledges she is technically not an oathbreaker, erases her memory, and grants a stay of execution.

Meanwhile, Evander has been hunting fleshtraders who traffic in divine body parts, discovering that consuming Eternal remains grants humans temporary god powers. Alexios orders Evander to kill Bryony, but after Evander spares her, a bloodied dress on the temple altar suggests someone else has killed the princess. The killer is Idris, who stabs Bryony on the remote Duehavn Ridge and abandons her. She dies briefly before Amara, a demigoddess with a damaged wing who is known to Evander, revives her and flies her through the Shroud to Evander's tower in Scillari.

Shocked to find Bryony alive, Evander restores her erased memory and heals her wounds using a long-dormant power that requires skin contact and produces involuntary arousal. They negotiate terms: He will train her and grant a three-day head start before hunting her. He reveals his real name and shows her his mother's library, the only surviving repository of the Turpori, Evander's lost people and culture. Amara begins brutal combat training, provoking Bryony's suppressed rage until she fights back, experiencing violence as agency for the first time.

Evander continues his duties as an Enforcer, one of Alexios' elite divine executioners, while privately questioning his orders. After discovering butchered demigod bodies and a charred ledger referencing "Rhosyn," a mysterious codename tied to the fleshtrade, he goads Bryony into fighting him to numb his pain. She refuses, telling him never to use her hands to hurt himself. Evander flies Bryony over the Osbu Sea, teaching her to trust the fall. When her mention of "Rhosyn" triggers a blocked memory, Evander takes her to the Duehavn Ridge, where she confesses Idris' betrayal. They share their first kiss, though both insist they are only pretending.

Their connection intensifies when Aethertide arrives, a centennial celestial event that triggers a biological mating imperative in Scillarian males. Evander locks himself away, but Bryony provokes a chase and they have sex for the first time. Over three days, he vows to crave her across every lifetime. The equilibrium shatters when Bastien, the God of Shadows and Evander's brother, arrives tracking Bryony's scent on Alexios' orders. Evander lies, claiming Bryony is merely a diversion: "Let her think she's special. Then let her realize she's been spreading her legs for the monster who's going to slit her throat anyway" (332). Bryony overhears and is devastated; during their final encounter, she takes control and declares she will haunt him forever.

Before leaving for Vartena, Bryony opens the one room Evander forbade her from entering and discovers a griefwood tree, a living memorial carved with marks for every person he lost in the war. Evander reveals that his mother, Astraea, was killed during the war and her body scattered through her own throne room, and that Bastien was captured and tortured in the Bloody Court, his wings removed so humans could consume his power. The glow of Devaliant skin, he tells her, results from ancestors consuming so much immortal flesh that it permanently altered their bloodline. Despite her horror, Bryony offers her life to settle the score and leaves with Amara.

Bryony infiltrates the palace to rescue Theodora, but Idris captures both sisters. Amara alerts Evander, who severs his connection to Alexios' suppressive collar and storms Hellevig. Bryony kills Idris by driving a blade into his jugular. In a forest clearing, Evander kneels and allows Bryony to touch his wings, the most sacred gesture in Scillarian culture, reserved for a Chosen, or soulbonded mate. They exchange blood and bites to seal a permanent bond that grants Bryony his lifespan.

Bastien tracks them and beats Evander for bonding with a Devaliant, revealing the full extent of his wartime torture: "They held me down and used me, Evander. Violated me. Mutilated me until I was unrecognizable" (391). Alexios arrives and shackles Evander. Bryony negotiates a bargain: She will undergo three tests, and if she survives, Evander's power will be fully unbound. The first test is a maze of living thorns; she survives by surrendering rather than fighting. In the second, Alexios severs her soulbond and sends her to the Onyx Keep, where Severin, the God of Death, attacks her but relents upon learning that Amara, his estranged Chosen, trained her.

Evander defeats 50 demigod challengers in the arena to prove his worthiness as king. Bryony secretly negotiates a final bargain, waiving her protection to fight in the arena herself. She defeats nine demigods before Alexios reveals himself as her last challenger. He offers the same choice Amalthea once faced: sacrifice her life for Evander's complete freedom. Bryony drives a blade into her own heart.

The realm resurrects Bryony with wings, white dappled with gold, transforming her into a demigoddess. Alexios presents a crystal seal; Bryony presses it to Evander's chest, removing his collar and releasing his full power. Evander punches through Alexios' stomach in retribution, then negotiates to bear a fifth of the Shroud's burden in exchange for free passage between realms so Bryony can visit Theodora, the sole surviving Anchor. In the epilogue, Bryony soars for the first time as Evander flies beside her over the site of their future palace. In the tower's garden, a single red rose blooms among the dead. Threads involving the fleshtrade and the Rhosyn codename remain unresolved, setting up subsequent volumes.