Unbound

Nessa Thorne is nineteen when she volunteers for the Empire's selection, certain it will end in her death. It does not. She is sent to Confluence Academy, a castle where students learn elemental magic and bond with beasts, from wolves to ancient dragons, to become the Empire's deadliest weapons.

Every student is branded with an affinity: water, air, earth or fire. Nessa's brand is a silver spiral, the mark of an unbound. The Empire claims her kind were hunted to extinction centuries ago, and the power they carried was judged too dangerous to allow.

She has to hide what she is. The academy runs on blood: students kill each other for advantage, and anyone who fails to tether an elemental is put to death. Her sharpest danger may be Raith Hollow, the only other volunteer, a powerful fire affinity who watches her constantly and keeps secrets that could topple kingdoms.

A slow burn romance runs through the school's violence and shifting alliances. Death once looked like a release from Nessa's painful past, but it no longer does. She must embrace her dangerous potential or lose everything she has fought to keep. The first book in a series, it closes on a cliffhanger.