Kiss of the Black Flame

Saige Grayson binds books for a living. She also lives with chronic pain and a debt that keeps growing. When she is traded to the Azkari, an immortal warrior people, she ends up locked inside their stronghold.

Her fellow prisoner is Archer, a general who has fallen and carries a curse. He makes her an offer: if she uses her craft to restore an ancient book woven from living magic, he will set her free.

The book could hold the means to stop a great evil. It could just as easily release that evil. As its magic stirs awake, Saige's past closes in on her, and both she and Archer must weigh what they are willing to stake.

This is the first volume of The Bookbinder's Bargain, an open-door epic romantasy. The romance grows out of forced proximity, and a found family of women gathers around Saige. Her pain stays part of the story throughout and is never treated as a problem to cure.

The question driving the book is whether a bargain struck in a prison can survive what the book wakes.