Book Blurb:
For over three hundred years, Arden's very existence has been hidden. Until one night, when the latest assassination attempt fails and the third Killian blade makes its appearance.
A powerful witch with little knowledge of her heritage, Arden's first step on the path of destiny is The Abbey. A place of sanctuary and power, it's a haven in a sea of unknowns and where she hopes to find an ally.
An Elven prince, a Fae lord, the First Vampire, a warlock, and the King of Dragons make up the Imperium Cadre, one of the most powerful cadres in existence. Owning and managing The Abbey for over a thousand years, they're not known for taking in strays. But Lord Theron's life debt paves Arden's entry into the formidable sphere of their protection.
As the sweeping winds of change blow, Arden and the cadre will navigate the path of destiny together. Secrets are revealed, heritage found, and alliances forged and lost.
Tropes:
*Netgalley ALC *Why Choose *Paranormal *spice *magical world *Magical beings
*Fae *Vampire *Witch *Dragon *demons *Reverse Harem *Urban Fantasy *Found family
*slow burn
Thoughts:
Arden (FMC) Grew up without really knowing anything about her family history she knew her mother was a powerful witch but her mother passed away when she was young her guardians tried to let her learn how she could but they were in hiding due to her mother's visions showing continued assassination attempts on Arden's life, she has no clue who her father was.
Arden remains with her adoptive family (a magical fae princess and a demon lord) until now when she ventures out to the Abbey to seek sanctuary and learn more about her past history.
Now Arden is inside the Abbey working at the night club and getting closer to the Imperium Cadre, initially not fully sold on the idea of taking Arden in Lord Theron (in charge of the Abbey) has a life debt with Arden's adoptive mother and she will consider it paid in full if he helps Arden with her mission to train and learn more about her family history.
While there Arden also finds that witches are not exactly nice either having a run in with a queen B at the night club who feels that Arden is below her in rank... when she is actually one of the most powerful at the club even able to go up against the members of the Imperium Cadre.
Arden learns more about the different magical abilities of witches and trains with her guys along the way learning that maybe growing up away from the witches isn't a bad thing... they believe that to be a proper member they need to have pure blood lines (no crossing between fae, dragon, vampire etc...)... Arden has never felt that pure blood created a family and has always loved the family that found her along the way, she's even feeling drawn to several different guys in different ways, it might not be love yet but she can definately feel something is blooming between them.
I listened to this and the narrators Ryan Lee Dunlap and Stefanie Kay did a great job with bringing the story to life.
Some things I enjoyed about this story:
I appreciated Arden being open to all different species, she wasn't closing herself off to love if it found her
Arden is strong and determined to find out more about her past and solve the mystery of who would want to attack her
I liked the guys --> I just had a hard time seperating them at times because there were so many of them introduced so quickly together.
I did start to become more invested towards the end when she finally was learning more about her family and the history of the witches, I will probably pick up the next book in the series at some point.
Some Negatives:
Arden is over 300 years old and at this point has been waiting for "the right moment" to seek out the knowledge of her family origins she is basing this off of a vision her mother had prior to her own death... due to her being older (although not as old as her romantic interests) she is proficient in everything pretty quickly without even trying that hard everything is just super low stakes and easy.
This might just be a me situation but due to the amount of male leads... I struggled with separating them one is a dragon shifter, one is a succubus, one is a fae, one is the first vampire, there might have been another one (?)... they are all insanely hot with muscles on muscles, I didn't dislike them, most of them just kind of blended together for me.
There is a "fated mate" plot line that feels kind of forced and doesn't seem to matter because she on board with being his fated mate... but also wants to keep her options open and I was like "oh no" when she introduced the guys to her family and said one of them was her fated mate and one was her lover...
I don't know how much time has passed or if she even spent all that much time with some of these guys, leading me to feel like we were being told how close they were vs. what I was actually hearing was happening, I didn't feel she was all that close with most of them.
I felt like there may have been too many plot points it was like "and this is happening" "but don't forget about this"... it was supposed to have a more serious vibe but there were dance battles at the club to modern day songs... the problems with the witches felt like mean girls in high school.
The characters were hundreds to thousands of years old but acted like they were in their late teens to early 20's.
Have you read this one? What did you think?
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