Everyone in her court blamed a curse for the rust eating their houses alive. She was the first person in three generations to ask the dragon what it was actually eating.
Fenlynn Ondrick has spent her whole life keeping a starved engine-house running on rationed iron and her own two hands, in a court that blames every crumbling gear on a curse laid by the dragon chained beneath the vein. When the old Warden of Corrigold dies without an heir, the court's oldest law wakes: each claimant is given command of a failing Engine-house for one season, and whoever restores hers most soundly, by the Guild's own ledger, is named Warden. Fenlynn never expected the law to name her, until Steward Grendric Wynhold, the man who controls every ounce of iron the court rations out, discovers she is the last living line of a disowned Ondrick daughter and drags her into the contest, certain a friendless engine-tender's house will be the easiest of the two claimants' to starve.Corwick Halvern, the Engine-Warden sworn to keep the Trial honest, was raised by Grendric since his own parents, both Wardens before him, died the year the ledgers came up wrong and no one asked why. He has never once put a hand on the scale, until a claimant with soot under her nails makes him question whether his oath was ever protecting the court, or only the man who raised him.
When Fenlynn's house fails despite everything she can do, the court calls it the curse drawing to unworthy blood, same as it always has. She refuses to believe it, and does something no claimant has done in three generations: she goes down into the vein alone and asks the dragon Ferroth, to her face, what the rust is actually eating.
Perfect for readers who love rival-heirs romance, morally-complicated oaths, and a dragon who finally gets to be asked instead of blamed.
- ⚙️ A hidden-power heroine who reads truth and lies in the way iron rusts, never a feeling, always something she watches happen
🐉 A dragon blamed for a curse she never laid, until she decides three generations of silence is enough
⚖️ An oath-bound Engine-Warden falling for the one claimant he's sworn to judge without favor
👑 A beloved Guild Steward whose whole authority rests on three generations of a lie
💍 Standalone romantasy with a full, satisfying HEA
Full-length romantasy (60,000+ words). Standalone love story with a satisfying HEA. Intended for readers 18+.
Genre: Fantasy
Used availability for Sasha Leone's Rustvein