The rebels have won, and the empire is withdrawing from Qazal. But undoing the tangled web that binds the two nations won't be easy, and Touraine and Luca will face their greatest challenge yet. Luca needs to oust her uncle from the Balladairan throne once and for all and take her rightful place as Queen. But he won't let go of power so easily. When he calls for a "Trial of Competence" and Luca's allies start disappearing from her side, she will have to prove her might. And she knows someone who can help...
Touraine has found a home in the newly free country of Qazal. However, she soon realizes that leading a country and leading a revolution are two very different tasks. And, even more importantly, if Luca won't keep her promises, the Qazali could end up right back where they started. Together, the two women must overcome their enemies, their history, and their heartbreak in order to secure Luca's power and Touraine's freedom.
"You haven't been just a soldier in a very long time". C.L Clark's The Faithless is the perfect middle book of a trilogy, hardly suffering from second book syndrome. Where the focus was on Touraine in the first book, now it's Luca taking center stage, giving us a much needed insight into the inner workings of her mind and the lengths she's willing to go to in order to win her throne. The setting works in her favor, showing her in her element, in a palace full of intrigue as she counts her friends and allies.
She and Touraine dance around each other for a solid chunk of the book, making this a delicious slowburn; we know that the attraction and affection between them are there, but they're on almost opposite sides, Touraine tasked to make the alliance work at any cost, Luca bent on preserving propriety. The longing is excquisite, and each moment they pass in each other's company is torture. The climax takes advantage of the edge of politics and gives them a solution that works because it's inherently theirs: they can make it work, and they will.
At the center is the conflict between Luca's empire and its once-colony, the land Touraine hails from and was taken from in order to become a soldier for the empire, trained in an experiment to prove the suitability of the "savages". Clark doesn's shy away from the brutality of colonialism, taking detours to another character left behind while she reckons with what's left to do at home after the battle's won. Meanwhile, the magical subplot emerges while the characters struggle, either to understand and master it or to win it for their own nation.
The world is painted vividly, made much grander as Clark dives into the empire and those who would seek to change things from the inside. That conflict will certainly be a focal point of the final book, and I for one can't wait for the conclusion to this engaging story of colonialism, duty, and love.
The Faithless is a solid sequel that sets the stage for what's to come.
✨ 4 stars
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