Cover reveal! Game of Thrones meets Shadow and Bone in the final book in this action-packed fantasy from Andrea Robertson, the internationally bestselling author of the Nightshade series. Coming to shelves May 16, 2023!

Scroll down to see the cover and read a sneak peek of Ara’s final adventure, and don’t forget to preorder your copy!

As far as lost brawls went, Teth’s scuffle with the Vokkan soldiers could have been worse.

Yes, his left eye was swollen shut, but he still had all his teeth. His body was a map of mottled blues and purples, but none of his bones were broken.

All in all, Teth had come out of the fight in fairly decent shape.

Except for the fact that he was now a prisoner.

No matter how he tried to spin that outcome, which he could usually do to make the best out of bad situations, he couldn’t find an upside to his capture.

Throughout the journey from the Great Market to Five Rivers, Teth looked for any opportunity to escape. None came.

He had presumed his time on the road with the soldiers would be rife with regular patrols and patterns that he could exploit. They would make camp for the night. There would be changes in the guard. Distractions would draw the soldiers’ attention from him.

He searched for anything that would give him the chance to flee his captors. But by what must be some of the Vokkan wizards’ magic, the guards had preternatural constitutions. They didn’t sleep. They rode at a relentless pace, stopping only briefly to change horses. During these short breaks, Teth was always accompanied by two guards and his shackles were never removed.

The brutal slog of the journey wore him down, but something more nagged at his mind and mood as they traveled north. The sight of the Vokkan soldiers surrounding him. The flapping of their tabards in the wind. The ching of their armor as their mounts trotted over the dusty road.

It was all . . . familiar. But that was impossible. Teth had never been in Vokkan captivity before. So why did his gut churn in a way it never had before when he’d found himself in a tight spot? What were these flickers in his mind’s eye, like shadows darting in and out, trying to draw his attention? A part of him wanted to focus on the strange feelings and puzzle them out, but another instinct warned him to turn away from the invasive thoughts as if there were something monstrous crouching behind those shadows.

At the beginning of the journey, Teth had been hopeful he’d only be in the Vokkans’ clutches a short while. A day, maybe two. But as the soldiers marched him down a long hallway in the Temple of Vokk, he wondered if he would even survive the day.

When he’d separated from Ara and Nimhea in the catacombs beneath the Great Market, he knew there was a good chance he’d be captured. His instincts whispered that the path Ara and the princess took led to a way out of the tunnels. He didn’t have a bad feeling about the other two passages, but there wasn’t the tingle of awareness—a quirk of sensation that always served him well as a thief.

He could have gone with them, but he wanted to give the Loresmith and the future queen of Saetlund the best chance of escape from the Vokkan soldiers. So he was the diversion.

Teth hoped by now Ara and Nimhea had reunited with Joar and Lahvja. He took it as a good sign that he was the only captive being dragged back to Five Rivers—at least he assumed that’s where he was being taken. If he’d been your run-of-the-mill lawbreaker, Teth might have ended up in a local stockade, but as a companion of the Loresmith there was no way he’d be so lucky. All agents of the Below knew how to spring themselves from the average holding cell, but Teth had no idea what awaited him in Saetlund’s capital.

Their group crested a hill, and in the valley below, Teth took in the glittering surface of the Lake of the Gods, that massive body of water that was fed by and itself fed into the five great rivers of Saetlund. The Isle of the Gods nestled like a dark green gem at the center of the velvet blue waters, its mysteries hidden from the outside world.

Teth’s gaze didn’t linger on the beauty of the lake and the island, instead shifting to the walled city on the lake’s northeastern shore. Five Rivers, home of the River Throne—the seat of Saetlund’s kings and queens. From this height and distance, he could see the towers and parapets of the royal palace, but he couldn’t stop himself from staring at a dark spire that pierced the sky. The Temple of Vokk.