Dawn of the Empress by Nerine Dorman, Daniel Hugo, Catriona Ross

The Winter Mage · Book Two

Dawn Clan does not bend. Not to the emperor's whims, not to the undead that press against the Neck every winter, and not to grief.

General Gohei has served Emperor Fukakusa all his life, and it has cost him everything he loved. Now the peninsula's clans are gathering to break the Obsidian fortress, and the emperor — vain, clever, and never braver than the men around him — has decided that Gohei's wife will lead the assault.

What follows binds three generations. Katsumoto, the son born on the eve of war, will serve his two years at the Neck and come home to a father who barely looks up. Takashi, the late child of a second marriage, will arrive at the imperial barracks with a talent for trouble and no wish to be a hero. And in the palace, twin princesses born without an heir's precedence between them are learning that the throne will go to whichever of them can win a game — and that only one of them intends to play fair.

The Obsidian War ended forty years ago. Dawn Clan is still paying for it.

Dawn of the Empress tells the story of the Obsidian War from the Dawn side, then carries the peninsula forty years beyond it. It can be read on its own; readers of Legacy of Obsidian will meet Linnard again, from the other side of the table.