Every decade, the Moonbound Trials turn the kingdom into a spectacle of blood and desire.
Dozens of "moon-touched" women are dragged from their homes, branded by lunar magic, and thrown into a lethal arena where feral packs hunt, rivals sabotage, and the royal court drinks in the carnage from gilded balconies. Win, and you earn one wish from the throne. Lose, and your blood feeds the wild.
Nyra Ashwyn wants no part of it.
Cursed from birth and treated as a bad omen in her village, she has only ever wanted one thing: a way out. Out of the whispers. Out of the fear. Out of the life that was decided for her before she ever drew breath.
But one forbidden spell gone wrong changes everything.
When the moon sears silver sigils into her skin, Nyra is dragged to the capital as "moon-touched" and paraded before the realm's most powerful alphas. She expects monsters.
Instead, she meets him.
Kael Draven Valerius, the Moonbound King-scarred, ruthless, and bound to a curse that has slaughtered every mate fate has ever tethered to him. The moment their eyes lock under the bloody moon, the bond snaps tight. Nyra stops being a disposable pawn and becomes the one woman the king can't afford to want.
To survive the Trials, Nyra is forced into the king's private orbit-training in his chambers, learning to fight, to command, and to call the wild magic humming beneath her skin. Nights blur the line between brutal lessons and burning temptation, and Kael's possessive "touch her and die" protection turns the arena into a battlefield of teeth, claws, and jealous alphas.
But the Trials were never designed to choose a bride.
They were built to break the woman destined to shatter the king's curse.
When the final moon rises, Nyra must decide:
Betray the man who awakened every dark, breathless craving she swore she'd never feel...
or burn the kingdom to keep their bond-and herself-alive.
Perfect for readers who crave dark fated mates, deadly mating trials, and a scarred wolf king who would burn the world rather than lose his queen.
