Denise Kendrick

In a fantasy world, a mix of medieval and futuristic, Malik and Ciaran are twin brothers and orphans who lives in a monastery. A big plague is fastly killing all the inhabitans of the village and Ciaran is sent to a nearby city (even if not so nearby...) to ask help. But he is injured during the trail and when he finally finds help and someone is sent to the village, he returns with the news that they all dead. Ciaran is adopted by a wealthy family and for fifteen years he is sure of the death of his brother, also cause he can't feel him in his mind as before. But then he sees a newspaper with the news of a new commercial trading with a border kingdom and the photo of the Lord who underwrites the contract: his brother.

Ciaran takes no time to go in search of his brother and as soon as he is out of the walls of the city, he begins to "feel" his brother again; the city has an artificial shield that has prevented him from connecting with his brother's mind. But when he finally finds Malik, is not the lost brother who welcomes him: Malik has years of pain not forgotten and turns in slave his new found brother. And not a normal slave, but a pleasure slave. Ciaran has a strong character and doesn't accept to be treat like a property. It's not the sexual aspect of his condition which bothers him, also in the past, when they were teens, Malik and Ciaran has shared much more things than normal brothers, but he is willing to give his body to his brother like a lover not like a slave. So you will hear Ciaran's thoughts for most of the book, but I have found very interesting also Malik, and how he has turned himself from being the less clever of the two brother into being the leader of the story.

In this fantasy world sex among men seems to be not a problem, but sex between brothers is still a forbidden act. And then Malik has a very strange relationship with Kava, the king, not at all what you would expect between a king and one of his lord...

Really buying this book I was expecting something more, I don't know, "kinky". This kind of stories, that I have recently learned, are called "twincest", usually have a different tone, more sexually explicit. Not that in this story you will not find sex (in fact there is a scene, between Ciaran and Dex, the best friend of Malik, that I have had some problem to accept), but really I was expecting it to happen more ofter and sooner in the story. Instead, in a rather long book for an ebook, it's not the main aspect. I'm not very fond of fantasy stories, but I have to say that this in particular, has kept high my attention till the end, and I'd be glad to be also a bit longer.… (mais)