The Shadow Crown
Sunlight turns sweat to silver as Cordelia crosses blades with Sir Garrick one more time, but this morning's drill is the last ordinary hour of her life. Bound by the Ashford Oath, a vow sealed generations before her birth, Cordelia has been forged into a weapon without ever being told what war awaits her. When the Shadow Crown resurfaces, an artifact of forbidden power thought lost to legend, the kingdom's fragile peace begins to crack. Whispers spread through court and countryside alike, and those who once stood beside Cordelia reveal ambitions of their own. Sir Garrick knows more than he has ever admitted, and his silence may be the deadliest betrayal of all. Hunted by forces that want the Crown buried and others who would see it worn, Cordelia is forced to leave everything familiar behind. Every ally carries a hidden agenda; every road leads deeper into a conspiracy rooted in her own bloodline. The oath she swore to honor may be the very chain designed to control her. To survive, Cordelia must master more than the sword, she must unravel the truth of why the Ashfords were chosen, and what price the Crown demands of its bearer. When the final confrontation comes, she will face an impossible choice: destroy the Shadow Crown and lose everything her family sacrificed to protect it, or take up its power and become the very darkness she was sworn to fight.