Part of The Ashes of Thezmarr
First published 2025
Wren Embervale is an alchemist, a poisoner, and a queen who hasn't claimed her throne yet. To take back her kingdom from the usurper Silas, she needs an army, and that army comes with a price: a strategic betrothal to Lord Darian Devereux. Wren accepts the arrangement. She knows how to play the long game. What she can't control is Torj Elderbrock, her Warsword and soul-bond, whose body is being slowly hollowed out by a creeping poison. Every day she stands beside Darian is a day Torj grows weaker. Silas tightens his grip on the midrealms through shadow alchemy, courtly enemies watch for any crack in Wren's composure, and Wren herself is fracturing. She built her reputation on cold calculation. Now the person she is bound to by something deeper than choice is dying, and the crown she needs may cost her the one thing she cannot replace. Silver and Smoke is the final book in Helen Scheuerer's Ashes of Thezmarr series, following the Sunday Times bestseller Iron and Embers.
Genres: romance, fantasy, dark-fantasy, epic-fantasy, fantasy-romance, dark-romance
Vibes: atmospheric, dark, emotional, gritty, intense, suspenseful
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, forced-proximity, slow-burn, soul-bond, strategic-marriage
Setting: Midrealms
453 pages · Kindle Edition · Tor Bramble
Content warnings: death, violence