Death continues to stalk me…
Enemies surrounding me at every corner,
wanting to pull the very seams of my new life apart.
But I’m no longer alone.
I’m surrounded by the men I love and new friends that I trust.
And our bonds are only growing stronger.

But the demons and nightmares of my past are resurfacing,
haunting our every move and attacking not only me,
but the people I love.

They’re cloaked in shadows and darkness,
creating more questions instead of revealing the answers we need.
But what hides in the dark, must come into the light eventually.

These blackened blades, strange marks and the very blood that runs through my veins, I’ll master them all and find the answers I need.
And when I do…my enemies will pay their debt in blood.

Part of me was really hoping this series would be a trilogy and this would be the last book, but that was me being overly optimistic. Davon clearly isn’t done with this series yet! This book came out on the 16th, and I patiently waited until Friday to read it. Not to be dramatic or anything, but OMG! I got so many answers to questions that had been brimming to the top of my head since I started this series. I have not felt this compelled to read a series since I read J Bree’s Tie that Bind series.

I forced myself to hoover, do my washing up and put my washing on before I sat down to read this. I knew once I started that I wouldn’t stop until it was finished.

Micai gets stronger with each turn of the page. Her resilience is unparalleled. The effort it takes her to split from her past trauma and take the crown for the badass bitch that she is shouldn’t be ignored. Characters with trauma are either wonderfully constructed or poorly maintained. Luckily, Micai is the former. I have rather enjoyed that her past trauma was lived before the books began. I think I might have mentioned this in a previous review, but if I had had to read through Micai’s initial treatment at the hands of her half-sister and the gormless idiots at the academy, I would have been hit by severe anxious adrenaline and probably not have made it through the book.

Having the trauma as an abstract, there but not there, gives Micai more room to grow and evolve – at least in my opinion. As the reader, we know much of what she has been through but we get to view her unwavering strength and resilience, instead of seeing her as weak and vulnerable and that makes her character more complex and more compelling. Don’t get me wrong, there are moments of vulnerability for Micai, there are still moments of weakness that compel her back to past memories, but she is much more than who she was before, and able to navigate with knowledge on her side instead of fumbling in the darkness – I hope that makes sense.

The Facility, the place where we first encountered Micai way back at the beginning of Book 1, becomes more of a focal point in this book. It is clear that The Facility is still working to some degree in the background of things, and whatever fear and anger Micai has around that place, she is not willing to rule out the possibility that it is still a threat. We see an emerging correlation between the Infernal Four, Micai, and Gadriel. It was a good time to solidify this, as before, there were many plot avenues, but they were separate, and as a reader, I couldn’t pinpoint which was the more important line to focus on.

Micai starts this book with 3 boyfriends. She ends the book with 3 confirmed mates, 1 almost revealed mate, and 1 seeing the error of his ways, a possible mate. This series has always been advertised as a reverse harem with 5 mates, so it was about time that those connections were solidified in some way. I enjoyed the pull and tug between them and the way that each MMC had their own arc to finding their way to Micai. It made the connection between them all more natural and allows the characters to come together both as individuals and collectively as a group.

Ezra, Micai’s first revealed mate, the siren of the group, becomes a champion and a well-earned safe space. We learn more about his past, and we learn, through Micai’s facts of their mating bond that were otherwise unknown. Towards the middle of the book, Ezra starts to experience nightmares that has Creed worried. As the reader, it was easy for me to understand what these dreams were and what they meant, but going forward, I do not know what significance they will have on the plot. It is another mystery to be unravelled. Many of the extra characters treat Ezra as a pretty face and continually try to get him to ‘see the light’ where Micai is concerned. I think these extra characters underestimate Ezra’s power, and it’s definitely a narrative that he leans into.

Annex, who was the first, really, to fall under Micai’s spell, is still as deranged and psychotic as he has been since he was first introduced. I have enjoyed the fact that he never hides his craziness and that he is unapologetially 100% himself. His nature tends to rub off on Micai in more ways than one! But he has the ability to make her smile, laugh, and relax among all the chaos that happens through this book and indeed through the two books before it. He’s happy, a little too happy, with his blade in his hand. He doesn’t give two shits about who he threatens, and he is fiercely protective of Micai. As her first friend and confidante, he has wormed his way into Micai’s heart and mine. I find his effortless energy amusing, and luckily, he hasn’t had to use his ‘special ability’ again.

Mal was an enigma for much of the first book and half of the second. Mal and his beast, well, you wouldn’t want to meet his beast anywhere, let alone in a dark alley. But Micai brings out something in Mal that he never thought possible, and once he allows her to peel back the layers of his onion, they fall into an easy camaraderie. Micai has the ability to calm Mal in a way that no one has been able to do before, and without Mal realising it, Micai managed to tame his beast long before he realised what she was to him. Sexually, Mal is the last of the three to connect with Macai, but it is no less thrilling to read. In all honesty, the way their encounter came about was so in character for Mal that it was impossible to think of it happening in any other way.

Creed was a little shit in book 2, and I wasn’t at all happy with him when I started to read this book. He always wants to be in control and know everything, but that can make him very narrow-minded and cynical. There is so much about Micai that he doesn’t trust, and not even seeing how she is around his brothers makes him back down from the crusade of angry words and dark glares he sends her way. It’s infuriating because you know deep down, as the reader, that his ‘ephiphany moment’ is coming, and I know he’ll end up being another mate. Creed keeps his cards close to his chest; he never gives more information than he is comfortable with, but through this book, we do see little openings, little nuggets of information that inform us on what is happening on the wider scale of the plot. Creed does fill Micai in on what they have been doing and does finally recognise she has a position with the four of them. However, he still has a lot of grovelling to do and knowing Micai, she isn’t going to make it easy for him.

Gadriel, the elven character of the group, has always been, in my eyes, slightly idiotic for taking three books to work out what Micai meant to him. To me, it has been obvious since the day their characters first started interacting. He is a fantastic defence teacher and comes from the Valor clan, a clan renowned for their fighting technique and bond with weapons. He has been secretly training and teaching Micai since book 1. He is a teacher at the academy, but I’ve never really felt like that position embodied him. More than he shaped it around himself. He has always firmly stood in Micai’s corner, and his actions in this book only prove that further. He finds himself in a bit of a bother in the latter half of the book, and at the end of this book, I’m aware he is alive and unscathed, but I am as in the dark as Micai when it comes to seeing him again.

I said from the beginning that Seria was a little shit, and I have further proven her shittiness in this book. I didn’t think it was possible for her to get more vindictive, more calculated, more ‘playing the long game’. At this point, I don’t even think she is biologically a Bane at all. I theorise that she integrated herself into Micai’s family as some sort of mission set to her by the greater Facility or another unknown partner. It was pretty established in book 2 that the bracelet Seria had given to Micai was draining Micai of her magical ability. That wasn’t it, though; the bracelet wasn’t just draining her power, it was feeding it to Seira. This leads me to believe that Seira is magically weak and has only managed to get to where she is – on top of the food chain – because she has been syphoning Micai’s magic. It certainly puts a lot of her schemes into place, and when Micai takes her trips down memory lane and recalls instances with Seria in the past, it makes for quite convincing evidence. I didn’t know at the end of book 2 how far Seria’s manipulations went. For a long time, I was convinced that she was working alone and was just a twisted family member trying to take everything for herself. Now, with certain knowledge revealed in this book, I believe it goes much deeper. I don’t think I’ve underestimated her character; I think I’ve just been oblivious as to how many layers she has. It is clear that she is involved in this scheme a lot more than originally suspected. How involved she is with the Facility or any other unknown forces is not something I have knowledge of right now, but I am sure it will be heavily explored in however many books remain in this series.

The change in behaviour of Knox was interesting to see unfold because of his past friendship with Micai as a child and his firm position as one of Seira’s men; it was almost calculated to see him unravel slightly in this book. It definitely gave me a lot of questions and links to the theories I have for Seria. It makes me wonder how far her manipulations go and whether those manipulations are born from a magic she specialises in or whether they are so powerful and consuming because she has been syphoning Micai’s powers. Again, I have no concrete answers for this, but it will be interesting to see how the dynamic between Seria’s four men continues through further books and what may or may not unravel because of it.

There are not many series of books that I would consider reading again. I’m very picky about what special books I have bonds with. For a long time, the only book series I would read over and over again was Harry Potter. Rereading books for me is all about comfort and familiarity; it calms me down. I could see myself rereading this series and discovering new elements each time. I think my perspective on it changes depending on what mood I am in when I read. There are many compelling elements, and they are all single strands to a greater narrative that is, as of yet, unsolved. It has been a while since I’ve read a book on Kindle that I also desire in paperback. In fact, the last was the new series by J Bree, of which I have read 2 books. I need this series on my shelves, even if it is more expensive to buy.

Why is that? Why are spicy books more expensive? I’m serious. A normal paperback is £7.99/£8.99, but a spicy book is £15.99 It makes no sense to me.

I am eager and anxious for the continuation of this series. It was bad enough waiting 10 days for this book to be released. I have no idea when the next book in this series will come out or if it is even written yet. I know I am heavily invested in this story, and the anticipation of seeing the series continue will definitely allow the plot to linger in my mind. I am waiting for my dreams to start including the characters of this book, as this always happens to me when I am reading a series I’m truly invested in. I look forward to the next instalment of this series, and if you are a person who is into the world of spicy reverse harem books, I’d give this one a try!

P.S.

The leaves on the tree outside my window are turning colour, and autumn is beginning to change the landscape around me. I have always found that I read more in the autumn and the winter as the nights darken and the cosiness seeps in. I completely cleared out my Kindle library and left in it only follow-up books to series I’ve started, or books I know I will read. There was a time when I had over 200 books in my library, and realistically, I was never going to read some of them, as my tastes are always changing. My top two genres are still Crime Thrillers & Spicy Romance. I think that will probably continue for a long while; I’m not bored with either of them yet.

Life is incredibly good at the moment, and that has been reflected in the number of books I’ve managed to read recently. While I have never reached the peak of reading 130 like I did in 2019, I have once more found my passion for reading since my working life has balanced out. It is amazing how life changes when you are truly happy doing what you enjoy. I have been on a book ban for most of the year – the exception being Kindle Unlimited – and I am slowly but surely whittling down my physical TBR pile. I have high hopes for my reading journey through the rest of 2025.