A Treaty of Blood and Bindings

she was meant to be a dragon's meal. instead, she set the table.

Braeda Stoengrain has always known where she belongs. At the hearth. She is a hearthkeeper, happiest among rising bread, simmering stews, and the work of feeding the people she loves.

Then one night, she is marked with the Bind.

In Braeda's world, that mark means she has been claimed as an offering to dragonkind. Once someone is Bound, even helping them can condemn another person to the same fate. By the time Braeda is locked inside an offering room, she already considers herself dead.

She expects monsters.

But the dragon meant to receive her doesn't kill her. Instead, Braeda finds marble halls, impossible magic, meals prepared for human tastes, and eventually a kitchen more beautiful than any she has ever seen.

There, Braeda finds something she thought the Bind had taken from her: a place where she can still be a Hearthkeeper.

But in a world where humans have always been prey, every meal brings her closer to an impossible question: what happens when predator and prey learn to share a table?

for readers who like: dragon fantasy, dangerous bargains, food as intimacy, captivity with moral tension, morally complicated monsters, and heroines who survive without surrendering who they are.

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