He’s the slave a dozen masters threw away.

She’s the lady no one in Er’Rets knows what to do with.

Now, they’re both wanted by a town full of traitors… and one another’s best chance of escape.

Born to serve, slave-turned-squire Mezaedo Chevyah was sent to Har Sha’ar with a simple plan: investigate a noblewoman’s disappearance, and prove to the Kingsguard that he’s worth keeping. Instead, he finds a bounty on his head, the voice of a dead villain stirring in the back of his mind, and two unlikely allies — one, a traitor, the other a lady as strange as her poison-toed slippers.

Lady Halona Pitney — anomaly, herbalist, and self-proclaimed harbinger of chaos — came back to Har Sha’ar to find her missing grandmother and confront her childhood friend, Erro Coble. But Erro has changed, and the secrets he’s keeping are the kind that get people killed. So when he asks her to help him smuggle a wounded squire out of the village — alive — how can she refuse?

Forced into an alliance no one wants, Mezaedo, Halona, and Erro have one chance to escape Har Sha’ar alive before every bounty hunter in the mountains closes in. But the wilderness beyond the walls hides a darkness worse than any of them imagined. Loyalties will fracture. Secrets will surface. And what’s growing between the squire and the lady may cost more than they know how to pay.

To survive what waits, Mezaedo and Halona will have to trust each other — and the God who carried them this far — before the dark swallows everyone they came to save.

Two unlikely hearts. Enemies on every side. A faith that may be the only thing left standing.