Nikolai Lantsov, King of Ravka, is trying to hold his country together after the events of Shadow and Bone while hiding something monstrous inside himself. A duology following the political aftermath of the first trilogy, with Nikolai and his general Zoya Nazyalensky navigating a kingdom still fractured by war, a new religious movement, and threats from within the court and without. More explicitly political than its predecessors, and more interested in what it means to lead than in the discovery of power.