This is the second fantasy romance novella I’ve read by Kati Wilde and, just like the first one, this story has me kind of shook.

All I could think about while I read this was how it gets at the core of what I’m looking for in a fantasy—this je ne sais quoi feeling of like.. I wish this was a video game, because I would definitely play it. It had a hero(ine)‘s journey, a dnd-ish world, and such a cool magic system. The fact that a magic system this cool fit in these short, very romance plot focused novellas blows my mind.

And I’m impressed that I enjoyed this romance as much as I did, given that it committed a fairly major faux pas imo: it started the story six months into their enemies-to-lovers forced proximity quest journey, many months after our barbarian hero had fallen in love with our noble-turned-adventurer heroine. So many things were skipped over that I wish I had seen! But still, I had a good time.

It was swoony and adventure-y, it was super campy (at one point, our hero risked his own life.. to eat her out 💀) and the way the quest tied into the romance plot made for a really good story.