by Freya Marske
First published 2026
At the Academie of the Grand Duchy of Sieuxerr, five student mages arrive for their Grand Exam, the brutal five-day trial that will determine their futures as healers. The rules are simple: complete five practical cases as a randomly assigned group, pass together or fail together. But when they discover a classmate's corpse in the exam hall on day one, the stakes change completely. The dead girl was brilliant, destined for first place, and each of the five remaining students shares a hidden connection with her. Now they must navigate their most crucial test while concealing dangerous secrets and hunting a killer among them. As the days tick by, they uncover a conspiracy that reaches far beyond their small group, one that could reshape their magical world entirely. With their careers, their lives, and potentially the fate of their society hanging in the balance, the five mages race to expose the truth before their time runs out.
Genres: mystery, fantasy, thriller, magic, young-adult, dark-academia
Vibes: atmospheric, dark, fast-paced, intense, mysterious, suspenseful
Tropes: forced-proximity, found-family, locked-room-mystery, secrets-and-lies
Setting: Academie of the Grand Duchy of Sieuxerr
464 pages · Paperback · Tor Books
Content warnings: death, murder