ONLY THE SHARPEST WILL SURVIVE “Court is filled with charming vipers,” I said, chin lifted. “But charming or not, we are vipers all the same.” In the Kingdom of Daradon, a persecuted few are Wielders – able to exert a physical power that extends beyond their visible body: a shimmering tendril that can pick a lock, a gentle coil that reaches out to give a loving caress, or an inexorable rope that will kill a man before he knows it is around his neck. Feared and mistrusted for this ability, Wielders have always been Hunted. Alissa Paine – heiress of a noble lineage, daughter of a Hunter family – is also a Wielder. And as she approaches her eighteenth Season, Alissa knows she has escaped execution so far only through painful self-control, and the fragile efforts of her beloved father. Summoned to the harsh and glittering royal court for the debutante season, Alissa finds herself trapped in a web of hidden intentions – and caught between two equally dangerous men. One is a brutal ruler with the handsome face of a fairytale prince, who would see her destroyed in an instant if the truth were known – and the other a beguiling foreign ambassador with secret agendas of his own. It’s Rose Season at the palace, but Alissa knows that survival will depend on being the most vicious of the thorns… WIELD YOUR POWER. GUARD YOUR SECRET. SURVIVE THE HUNT.
