I've lived in the mud quarter in the entire life, watching as the fireguards came every five years to select the prettiest girls to go to the Seat to start new lives—husbands, houses without a speck of dirt, and enough food that hunger wasn't a constant pain in your belly. This year it's my turn. And the dragon that forces our kingdom to cower under our magnificent dome and hide behind stone walls hasn't shown any signs of leaving.

The princes have lied. The queen controls everything, including the dragons. At first I just wanted to save my people in the mud quarter, but I can't do it alone. I'm not running away; I'm regrouping so I can return to finally free everyone from the dragon's curse. In order to defeat evil, I'm going to have to embrace the darkness, and journey into the abandoned mines on the outskirts of the kingdom, meeting the demons themselves. And the princes? If they have truly chosen me, then we will see in time just how much weight a dragon's promise holds. I won't end up like the king, discarded and forgotten. No one will forget the name of Marigold Mudthrice; Queen of Bones & Ashes.

Years after the curse was broken, Mari discovers that the hardest dragons to tame aren’t full-grown princes—they’re half-grown teenagers with wings, fangs, and feelings. When a frightened neighboring city brands the fledgling flyers “monsters,” Mari must decide whether to keep her new family hidden or fight for a world that will accept them—before the teens’ own rage ignites a second war. When twenty-year-old Nuri—the first true draken—lets her fury be seen from the mainland, the fragile refuge her patched-together family has built on Lyoness is shattered, forcing her to choose whether to stay hidden, run alone, or start a war that could wipe out both drakens and humans.