Kiva Meridan is a seventeen year old healer at Zalindov, a deadly prison full of criminals and disease. When the Rebel Queen arrives to the prison broken and battered, it is Kiva’s job to nurse the notorious woman back to health. The task is quite difficult, and it doesn’t help that there’s a deadline. The Rebel Queen is to participate in a trial in which only the most dangerous people can compete. Unable to heal the Queen in time, Kiva must risk her own life after a message from her family tells her to keep the Queen alive at all costs. If Kiva is to succeed and win the trial, both she and the Rebel Queen will be freed. If not, the Queen will be killed alongside Kiva. While caring for the Rebel Queen, investigating a mysterious disease with a curious new inmate, and risking her life in the trials, Kiva has to decide what matters most to her and if she is willing to do whatever it takes to get it.
This book was a solid fantasy read, and I rather enjoyed it. The characters were well developed, and I liked the different storylines. There were multiple problems to solve, which all required attention and all spun together in the end. The twists and turns of the book were foreshadowed, but not everything was predictable. I would recommend this book for anyone that liked Throne of Glass. This was also a pretty easy read, as I became immersed quickly, and I finished it in about three hours. I would rate this book five out of five stars, as it was written well and an overall great book.