When Cinders Choose

by Elowen Hart

Heat 3 / 5Novella · 12 chapters29,998 words2h 10m read~3h 20m listen

Beneath the Ashen Palace, where every drop of ash-born magic carves its price into skin and memory, Princess Eloise Frost keeps her secrets in ink. By night she is the ember clergy’s forbidden scribe, copying contracts she is never meant to read. By day she is the dutiful royal who once helped condemn an exile house — and has spent years pretending she does not remember the name she wronged.

One storm. One stolen masque identity. One desperate, forbidden forgery — and Sablebb Pereira’s name burns itself into a treason oath Eloise wrote with her own trembling hand.

Now the Glass Court has its solution: bind the wounded houses with a wedding. Eloise will marry the exile prince she betrayed. Sablebb will marry the princess he is certain is still plotting against him. The ash-born contract has other plans — it is pulling toward the next masquerade like a tide, and the ember clergy’s warning is simple and absolute: before the last dance ends, the magic will collect what it is owed.

Court IntrigueEnemies To LoversDark RomantasyArranged Marriage