Book excerpt: 2016 Kindle Scout Selection. BRITAIN, 657 AD Snow is falling in the Kingdom of Kent when Ermenilda and Wulfhere meet for the first time. She is a Kentish princess, determined to take the veil. He is an exiled prince of Mercia, ruled by ambition. To win Ermenilda, Wulfhere promises her father he will take back the Mercian throne. He will also renounce his pagan ways and convert to Christianity. When the king agrees, Ermenilda is devastated. Trapped in a marriage she does not want, Ermenilda struggles between her unexpected passion for her husband and hatred for his harsh, warmongering ways. Wulfhere, initially secure in the knowledge that he has claimed the only woman he will ever want, soon begins to realize that possessing a woman and owning her heart are not the same thing.