Yasmine is a marquis' daughter who rides to the southern front and comes home with a victory and a captured crown prince in tow. The court's reward for the general who saved the empire is a political marriage to her own prisoner, a match meant to keep her power in check.
She accepts the match and turns it into ground. Working from inside the palace, she plays the factions against each other, builds allies among the officials who once wanted her sidelined, and outpaces every rival who assumes a bride has no leverage. What's at stake is the throne itself, and whether she can put her daughter on it as the nation's first female emperor.
