The river is a god. The god is hungry. For fifteen years, Osogó has carried its dead. He is the ferryman---the silent man who rows bodies across the water in the dark and asks the living nothing. He walked into the river once, to drown. It refused him. He has never learned why. So when a warlord's wife steps onto his jetty with a fistful of gold and a destination she will not say, he expects only another crossing. He does not expect the girl folded into the bottom of his canoe: eleven years old, a scar on her shoulder, a mouth that will not close, and more of this war already behind her than most men live to see. She tells him his boat smells of dead fish. She asks the questions no one can answer. And against everything he has made himself into, she is impossible to ignore. In a drowning country where the water takes whole villages and the war runs on children, a man who buried his soul at the bottom of the river is about to learn what it costs to come back up.

𝑱𝒐𝒍𝒊𝒆 𝒍𝒂𝒊𝒅𝒆. 𝑼𝒈𝒍𝒚 𝒃𝒆𝒂𝒖𝒕𝒊𝒇𝒖𝒍. 𝑰'𝒅 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒌 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒉𝒓𝒂𝒔𝒆 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒔𝒆𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒆𝒚𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒈𝒂𝒊𝒏. 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒔 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒉𝒆𝒓, 𝒕𝒐 𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒆𝒚𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒉𝒆𝒍𝒅 𝒎𝒚 𝒈𝒂𝒛𝒆, 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒄𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒎𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝒑𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝒂𝒏 𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒆𝒄𝒕 𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒆𝒅 𝒊𝒏 𝒂𝒎𝒃𝒆𝒓. In a world divided by war, peace is the greatest temptation-and the most dangerous risk. Laela, a defiant elf of the forest kingdom Baequinnanea, has spent her life fighting for her people's survival. Agile, cunning, and fiercely loyal, she knows the cost of war all too well. When she's chosen to represent her kingdom in a precarious peace treaty, she's thrust into an unfamiliar neutral city-and into the company of her sworn enemy. Thosar, the cold and calculating crown prince of the powerful elven empire Banniurdrenn, sees the treaty as a political game. To him, Laela is little more than a naive wildling, out of her depth and beneath his notice. But as the two are forced to work together in this fragile truce, their differences spark more than animosity. Amid shadowy betrayals and hidden agendas, Laela and Thosar must navigate a web of lies-and their growing connection. But with centuries of hatred between their people, can they truly build peace? Or will their fragile bond shatter under the weight of duty, loyalty, and the dark temptations of power? Two enemies. One chance for peace. And a choice that could change their world forever.

She wasn't born to win. Just survive. In a world where love came with conditions and dreams were punished, Mun learned how to keep breathing-quietly, painfully, invisibly. But when even your family wants to forget you exist, how do you hold on to yourself?