As a young girl, Nona Grey was saved from the noose by the Abbess of Sweet Mercy. But behind the convent's walls, she learned not a life of prayer and isolation, but one of the blade and the fist. Now she will serve as the convent's fiercest protector as the emperor moves to destroy the last bastion that stands against him.

As Crispin tries to fulfill Bear's dream of moving to Iceland, he must leave Troth behind at a convent that needs a healer but, after falling in with thieves posing as musicians, he makes a new friend, Owen, and together they continue the arduous journey.

Raised in an isolated abbey, Lady Maribel desires nothing more than to become a nun and continue practicing her healing arts. She's carefree and happy with her life...until a visitor comes to the abbey and reveals her true identity as one of the lost princesses. When he was a young boy, Edmund Chambers helplessly watched King Ethelwulf murder his family. Edmund escaped and has lived in the abbey ever since, uniquely trained to work with wild animals....

"The international bestselling author of the Broken Empire and the Red Queen's War trilogies begins a stunning epic fantasy series about a secretive order of holy warriors ... At the Convent of Sweet Mercy, young girls are raised to be killers. In some few children the old bloods show, gifting rare talents that can be honed to deadly or mystic effect. But even the mistresses of sword and shadow don't truly understand what they have purchased when...