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Needing additional information, Poppy asks many, many questions and finds out that the bond between Kieran and Cas really is broken, that what Alastir said is wrong, and that Cas drained every drop of blood from her to Ascend her because she did, indeed, die. He says she no longer feels mortal to him, nor does she smell that way to Kieran. Instead, they tell her she feels like final and absolute power.
Wondering if Ian might be like her, stronger but not actually Ascended, she sets off, seeing the mist thinning for her and the golden trees of Aios now blood-red.
When they arrive at Saion’s Cove, the older citizens bow to Poppy and call her Meyaah Liessa—my Queen—and she discovers that she can communicate telepathically with the wolven. She then exacts her revenge on Alastir, vowing never to think about him again.
Everything that has happened in such a short time becomes overwhelming for Poppy—can you blame her?—and she shows the emotion she always tries so hard to hide. Cas is there to comfort her, and they relax by reading some of my steamiest diary entries.
I always hoped someone would come across those journals someday.
Poppy and Cas discuss her claim to the throne, and Cas admits that he will support her if she wants the Crown but says that if she doesn’t, they’ll have to leave Atlantia. She finds herself torn.
When she’s suddenly summoned to help a child, she learns that her powers have evolved even more, allowing her to not only heal but also bring someone back to life. And when she finds out that Nyktos and his Consort had two children, their names and genders unknown, it gets her thinking.
Especially when she’s later told that not even the children of deities had abilities that manifested as strongly as hers. Not even the most powerful Elemental can do what she can. When the Queen reveals that Poppy has some of the same powers as Malec, she starts to wonder if the Duchess was right. However, she also learns that Malec cannot be her father since Eloana insists she entombed him before Poppy was conceived. The only thing they can deduce for sure is that, somehow, she is Nyktos’s descendant. Poppy can’t help but worry that her mother was an Atlantian held by the Blood Crown and forced into pregnancy.
It comes to light that Eloana, Valyn, and the Elders—it was not unanimous with us—have already decided on war and plan to burn Carsodonia to the ground, and she knows that only she and Cas can stop it. But only if they’re King and Queen. Coming to terms with the fact that not everyone will accept her, Poppy makes her decision.
Suddenly, Ian arrives and summons them to Oak Ambler. She finally sees him and knows she may have to make a tough choice soon: ending him if the brother she knows is gone. In addition, she recognizes that it may be a trap, even though the Queen promised not to harm them if they kept the Atlantian armies at bay.
When the Unseen attack again with no intention of leaving her alive, she unleashes her power once more, remarking that any who try to stop her from taking the crown will fail.
As a Council Elder, I am lucky enough to be in attendance before the crowning and discuss several things with Poppy: her night at the Red Pearl, her lineage, and her need to go to Iliseeum. I also get to announce the happy new couple—the King and Queen who will usher in a whole new era. They are the King of Blood and Ash and the Queen of Flesh and Fire.
Poppy and Cas ask Kieran to be their Advisor, and thinking back on the discussion she had with me and the other facts she knows, she comes to the conclusion that Nyktos’s guards are the draken.
She and her most trusted venture through the mists near the Mountains of Nyktos and into Dalos, coming face-to-face with the draken and the King of Gods. She then learns about the Consort and her beginnings, reminded again that gods should not be born in the mortal realm…yet there she stands.
After telling Nyktos about the Revenants, he remarks that they are abominations and apologizes for what Poppy will have to face in the coming days. He then reminds her that she was born of flesh with the fire of the gods in her blood, tells her that she is the bringer of life and death, calls her the Queen of Flesh and Fire, who is due more than one crown and kingdom, and reiterates that she’s always had the power within her.
Boarding a ship for their next destination, Poppy and Cas grow closer, exploring more of their desires—with a little help from page two hundred and thirty-eight of my journal. Mmm, yes. That was a good one.
In Oak Ambler, Poppy sees a large cat in a cage and has a flashback to the one she saw as a child. Her power hums in her chest, and it forces the feline to shift into a man. She promises that she will be back for him and wonders if it could be Malec. When she asks about it, she’s told that Malec wasn’t that kind of deity. Besides, he is supposedly entombed. The cave cat cannot be him.
When brought before Queen Ileana, Poppy vows that the Blood Crown will never lay a hand on her husband again and is finally able to at least see and hug her good friend. Tawny was her companion and confidante for most of her life as the Maiden, and the one person she was able to talk to who knew her without the veil. She’s missed her.
In her tête-à-tête with Ileana, many machinations are revealed. The Blood Queen tells them that she always planned for Poppy to become Queen of Atlantia, but that she assumed it would be with Malik as her King. She also says she’d rather see the whole kingdom burn than hand over a single acre of land.
Then she drops the biggest bombshell of all and tells Poppy she’s her mother, that her real name is Isbeth, that Cora didn’t agree with her plans and thus tried to spirit Poppy away, and that while Coralena survived the attack at Lockswood, she did not survive the Queen’s wrath.
It’s also revealed that Malec is a god. Poppy suddenly remembers what Nyktos said to her. She asks about it, and Isbeth confirms that everything she did, she did for revenge. In a petty snit, she has Ian killed, and Poppy’s ancient instincts take over, activating her powers. They fight like gods, and Isbeth ends up killing Lyra, Kieran’s friend and lover.
Poppy eventually falls unconscious and later wakes to find that Casteel handed himself over to the Blood Crown. In her rage, she summons another storm. A female Revenant approaches and tells her to quit what she’s doing, threatening to stop her if she does not. When Poppy finally stands down, she finds that Tawny has been wounded by shadowstone—something Poppy is unable to heal, even with her newly acquired powers.
Through the process of elimination and some deduction, Poppy realizes that the Consort must be her grandmother, and that Isbeth’s vendetta is utterly personal. Eloana took Isbeth’s son, so Isbeth took Casteel. And despite Malec being entombed, Isbeth and Malec must be her parents.
She decides to summon the draken and do whatever is necessary to bring Casteel home. When she and Kieran arrive in Iliseeum, she finds Nektas, Nyktos’s closest draken guard, in his god form. He tells her that Nyktos returned to sleep with his Consort. He then asks Poppy if she is willing to bear the weight of two Crowns and bring back what is theirs to protect and the thing that will allow the Consort to wake. Poppy finds out that is the missing draken—Nektas’s daughter, Jadis—and the Consort’s son, whom Poppy discovers is not Malec but rather his twin, Ires.
When the realization hits her that the caged cave cat was her father, she summons the draken and sets off for the mortal realm once more, visiting Tawny and reuniting with others. Returning to Oak Ambler, she meets with Jalara. She tells the King that she has a message for the Blood Queen and then beheads him, using him as the message. She then destroys the Queen’s knights, unleashes the draken, and tells the Revenant to deliver the full message to the Queen, reiterating that she is coming for Isbeth. Her last words ring in the air: “I am the Chosen, The One who is Blessed, and I carry the blood of the King of Gods in me. I am Liessa to the wolven, the second daughter, the true heir, owed the crowns for Atlantia and Solis. I am the Queen of Flesh and Fire, and the god’s guards ride with me. Tell the Blood Queen to prepare for war.”
As Poppy readies herself to rescue Cas and get her vengeance, her powers grow even more, making the trees shake and the weather rage. She takes out the Ascended stronghold at Massene and makes some connections.
Unable to eat or sleep, she keeps rehashing what went down at Oak Ambler and wonders if they have a traitor in their midst—someone other than Alastir.
As the days pass, Poppy and Kieran grow closer in their shared grief over Cas’s imprisonment, and Poppy uncovers something interesting: There is a record of a Rite at the time of the gods, and second and third children in the history books have no death dates. This leads her to the conclusion that the Rite existed before the Ascended but was eventually lost to time until it was bastardized and taken up again by the vamprys.
In talking with Reaver, one of the draken who answered her summons, she finds out they are bonded to her like the wolven, but it’s slightly different. They can’t communicate with her like the wolven can, but they will answer her call. He says it’s always been that way with Primals and tells her she’s not wise.
Reaver clearly has no filter, and I’m not sure Poppy caught that nonchalant drop of her true state—that she’s a Primal.
