Thorns Between Us: Every Touch Bleeds, but Love Still Reaches Through the Thorns

"Every touch bleeds, but love still reaches through the thorns." Peace came at the price of silence. Three winters have passed since the mirrors shattered and the Shadow Crown was buried in its own ashes. The kingdom of Valehart rebuilds in half-light—its people mending stone and memory, its king pretending that mercy can erase what was done in the dark. Elion Valehart wears a crown forged from regret. Once the light of his realm, now he governs a city that still flinches at its own reflection. Each dawn begins the same way: with his name carried by a silence that feels too alive, and a heartbeat that is no longer his own. Across the sealed gate of thorns, a shadow stirs. Serath—once the general who died for treason and love—awakens in flesh that is not entirely human. His memories bleed through the skin like ink through parchment, and every whisper of the king's name draws him closer to what he was…and to the man who damned him. Between them lies a world that remembers too well: a church that prays to purity and fears affection, a court built on bargains with ghosts, and an empire still learning that peace is only the pause between betrayals. When an assassin made of glass crosses the border between life and legend, Elion must choose between the law that keeps his people safe and the love that could destroy him again. Serath, bound to the shadow of his own resurrection, must decide whether to save the king who once killed him—or finish what death could not. As the thorns between them tighten, devotion becomes defiance. Desire becomes weapon. And the kingdom's last chance at salvation may rest in a touch that was never meant to be forgiven. Thorns Between Us is a lyrical, slow-burn romantasy of war's aftermath and the impossible tenderness that survives it. Blending gothic atmosphere, political intrigue, and the ache of forbidden love, Book II of Hearts of the Eclipse continues the story of Elion Valehart and Serath Nyxen—two souls bound by oath, shadow, and blood. In this world, mercy cuts deeper than vengeance, and even gods must learn to kneel.