Spark of the Everflame (Kindred's Curse, #1)

by Penn Cole

For anyone who has ever been told their spark shouldn’t burn so bright and for all the people who loved them precisely because it did.

As usual, the Descended claimed the erasure was in our best interests, a “symbolic unification” to assimilate our two races. I suspected it was really meant to serve as an ongoing threat that we mortals could be wiped away with the same ruthless efficiency our culture had been.

oop

I would live a nice, long life. A safe life. So why did the very thought of it make me want to tear my hair out?

But I was made of swinging fists and rash words, my edges too jagged and my temper too hot. Nothing about me was delicate

I didn’t want gentle or delicate. I wanted to burn.

I wondered how long I had until the fire in my soul burned me alive.

Gods, imagine the man in bed... he probably demanded his lovers address him by title there, too. Harder, Your Highness. Wilst thou give me permission to come, Your Highness? Let me kneel for you and show the Prince’s little prince a good time, Your H—

“Lumnos herself couldn’t pull me from her side.”

Someone was holding my hand, our fingers interlocked. A tingling thread of energy crept up my arm where our skin made contact. And they were talking to me.

The King gasped, his grip on me tightening. “I am not afraid, Devourer of Crowns. Ravager of Realms. Herald of Vengeance.”

“Give him our gift, Daughter of the Forgotten. When the end has come, and the blood has spilled, give our gift to my faithful heir, and tell him this is my command

“You think I fear my own death?” he whispered in my ear. “Every day I draw breath is as much a curse as a gift. I’ve been living on borrowed time for longer than you can imagine. If you’re the way my fate finally catches up to me, I can’t fathom a more beautiful end.”

“Let me die with the taste of you on my lips.”

but the only words of my father’s that surfaced were utterly useless and horrifyingly mad: The truth is that I just knew.

How was it possible for me to love people so deeply on both sides of this war?

“Diem—you’re wearing the Crown. You’ve been selected. You are the new Queen of Lumnos.”