Author:  David Blixt​

 

The explosive fourth novel in the Star-Cross'd series! Verona has won its war with Padua, but the architect of the peace has lost his war with the stars. The young prodigy Cesco now turns his troubled brilliance to darker purposes, undermining years of work on his behalf. Alienating friends and family, embracing a riotous life and sharing his home with a wife he can barely look upon, he is on the road to his own destruction, challenging not only the lord of Verona and the Chruch, but God Himself. Trying desperately to salvage what's left of his spirit is Pietro Alaghieri, knight and newly-named Count. But even as Pietro reaches heights he had never dreamed of, his heart breaks as he watches his foster son spiral into dissolution and despair. For once Pietro welcomes the many plots and intrigues of the Veronese court, hoping they will shake the young man out of his torpor. But when the first body falls, it becomes clear that this new game is deadly, and will lead only to doom them all.

Finalist for the 2015 M.M. Bennetts Award for Historical Fiction