Book excerpt: She's the last member of a cursed and deadly clan. He's the crown prince with a dangerous secret. Together, they'll save the empire. Or destroy it. Decades ago, the High King of Sundolia waged a war that vanquished the Serpent clan and drove them out of the empire, reducing them to nothing more than legends spoken of in occasional frightened whispers. But they did not leave peacefully. Their parting gift included curses that now rest within the empire's soil, beneath the shade of its jungles, treading through the waves of its seas. Growing more and more dormant as the years pass under the rule of that increasingly tyrannical high king. Until Alaya--a young woman with a hidden Serpent mark who shouldn't exist--accidentally wakes one of them up. Then another. And suddenly she finds herself exiled from her adopted village and left with no choice but to seek the truth about her lost clan and the so-called curses they left behind. About her true home. About a power, stolen from the Serpent goddess herself, that is supposedly resting in that home. It is the sort of power that could help her overthrow a king, expose the lies he's told, and put a stop to his wars. The crown prince of Sundolia claims he wants to put a stop to those wars with her. That he only wants to help her find that power so he can undo the horrors his father has created. All they have to do is find a way to trust each other. But the closer they get to that power, the more complicated the truth--and the trust-- becomes. The more dangerous Alaya's waking power seems. And the more she begins to wonder: Can you still be the hero if you were born a curse?