A world frozen by a failed god. A kingdom dying of thirst. A spark that could burn it all down.
In the kingdom of Alare, the sun offers light but no warmth. Since the Great Eclipse shattered the sacred Covenant, a spiritual frost has gripped the south, turning lush forests into silver ash and the Great Spring into sluggish mud.
Abike, known as the Porcelain Princess, lives behind palace walls, draped in coral and gold to hide the rot of a failing empire. Her father, the High Chief, has brokered a desperate trade: Abike's hand in marriage to a Northern Prince in exchange for the water that will keep Alare from turning to dust.
Prince Adejumo arrives from the Sun-Scourged Plains not as a conqueror, but as a beggar in a soldier's cloak. His people are perishing under a sun that has forgotten how to be merciful, and Alare's rumored gold and aquifers are his last hope.
But the true hope of Alare lies in the forbidden Ash-lands. There, Okanlawon, a descendant of the man who let the Sacred Flame die, discovers the impossible: the Agbe-de, a glowing flower pulsing with the ancient heat of the Forge.
As the frost-webs of an ancient evil begin to tighten and political lies unravel, an unlikely trio must choose: will they cage the light to save their thrones, or release the fire to save the world?
