Empire of Sand

Mehr is the illegitimate daughter of a provincial governor in the Ambhan Empire and an Amrithi mother, a member of a nomadic desert people persecuted for their magic. Forbidden by law and custom from using what her mother's blood gave her, she has hidden it for years. Then a storm of dreamfire falls on her city, and Mehr dances an Amrithi rite to save lives, catching the eye of the Maha, the ancient immortal who rules the Empire from the shadows through an order of bound mystics.

To protect her family, Mehr accepts the Maha's command to marry Amun, one of his mystics, and live in a remote desert monastery. On her wedding night she learns that Amun is Amrithi too, bound to the Maha by magical vows that her own marriage vow now draws her into.

The Maha means to use a corrupted Amrithi dance, performed by a man and a woman together, to shape the dreams of the sleeping gods. Mehr and Amun must find a way to resist him without becoming the kind of people he has made them.

Empire of Sand is the first book of The Books of Ambha, a debut fantasy inspired by Mughal India. It follows Mehr's struggle for freedom inside a rigid, patriarchal empire, with slow-building trust between two people forced together.