A Heart of Blood and Ashes meets The Witcher in this sexy, action-packed fantasy romance. Two rival mercenary clans - Sanguine and Stygian. Kara is seeking revenge against the Sanguines to avenge her family. Logan is the Stygian commander, and he offers Kara the training she needs to achieve her vengeance, but he demands a steep price. Together they'll risk everything, going head to head with the Sanguines and awakening a dark curse that demands to be sated with passion or violence.In a world where mercenary clans hold all the power and children are cursed from birth by blood magic, Kara McKenna is one of the unlucky ones. Marked by a curse that awakens if she’s responsible for someone’s death, she’s spent her entire life as an outcast. She’s working as a farrier in the mountain reaches when the Sanguine Riders invade in search of a cursed woman. Kara’s family is killed in the ensuing violence, and she’s left destitute, homeless, and alone. She resolves to join the Sanguine’s rival clan—the Stygian Brotherhood—for the training that will enable her revenge.Tensions flare amid the training yard as Kara and the Stygian commander, Logan Vakarian, wrestle with their growing attraction to one another. If she succeeds in her revenge and her curse awakens, she’ll have to feed its dark appetites with violence or passion each month, or risk succumbing to a blood rage.As Kara’s hunt for the mercenaries responsible for her family’s death comes to a head and her relationship with Logan deepens, she’ll be forced to choose where her loyalties lie—with the only family she has left, or the deadly mercenary she’s falling in love with.