Aithin

by Wendy Clements

What if Princess Madeleine Lockienhylm's brother Geoffrey did succeed in killing her? She wouldn't be subjected to a forced engagement with a bond ring by her cousin. She wouldn't have to think about the fact everything she's believed in for the past nineteen years has been at best a contortion of the truth, and that it's becoming harder and harder to force the facets of her life to co-exist. Madeleine is a young woman from Rial Oman torn between loyalty to the Ducet--an espionage unit operating under her father, the king--and her desire to work as a Healer, where her true gifts may lie. She discovers the true cause of her magical abilities, always considered an oddity in her family. She is half-Aithin--magic users who have been regulated under the rule of the king. She tries to sort out her growing discontent at working for the Ducet, and there is something she can't remember having to do with a Ducet mission gone awry, where she was the only one left alive--but unconscious--at the scene of a murder. Two leaders of a Southern continent decide to take advantage of the current confusion Madeleine is causing in the royal family to make a pull for independence, which they have been orchestrating for years but waiting for the right moment to put into action.The upheaval in Madeleine's life when those facets collide force her to re-examine her life through a path of discovery including death, betrayal, reunited family, and unexpected love, set against the backdrop of an impending revolution and changes in the political structure of her family.

Genres: Fiction

524 pages, Paperback

First published June 18, 2010

About the author

Wendy has her MA in English Literature, with an emphasis on Gothic Fiction, and lives surrounded by books, rocks (crystals and other shiny pretty ones), and jewelry making tools.