The Splintered Princess

Every empress must learn to play hard or lose it all. Alynah Commonborn has always believed she's meant for a simple life on her parents' farm. But when she recklessly chooses a dagger in the sunlit corner of a teeming marketplace, it foretells her destiny as an empress. The cost of that destiny, however, means she'll eventually kill someone she loves with that same blade.Then he steps onto her path. A man who never tells her his name but who becomes irrevocably entwined with her life during a single day of bliss - a dozen hours - before he's taken by their common enemy.He breaks off a piece of his spirit and sends it to her, and they share hundreds of nights, thousands of heartbeats, and countless breathless moments.When she's abducted by the overlord who might be her real father to train as the protector of his young queen, she immerses herself in training, determined to escape and find her true even though he's become something depraved and pitiless. This is an adult fantasy, so it contains some adult themes and occasional adult language. Don't be deceived that it starts when the character is only 16. It may seem YA, but the series is very much adult.