An herbalist with something to hide escapes into the reluctant arms of a foreign doomsday prophet when her high-born lover brushes too near the truth.
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 100,000 words
Status: Complete
Awards: Finalist in 2007 ACFW Genesis Contest (Spec Fic Division)
Winner in NYT bestselling author Tosca Lee’s 2007 contest
Finalist in 2009 ACFW Genesis Contest (Spec Fic Division)
Taifa hoped it would escape the goddess Majai’s scrutiny that she’d never given a firstborn for sacrifice, but when the king demands her life in exchange for the unconceived child’s, she knows she’s out of time. Taifa grasps at the offered straw–her life spared if she will neutralize the foreign doomsday prophet, Shanh, who has caused dissension amongst the people.
Shanh’s mission had looked simple: deliver his god’s message and return to his homeland. But his god does not protect him against the scheming local woman, Taifa. Inexplicably, it seems to be Azhvah’s will that Shanh rescue this heathen from the fate she brought upon herself. Bound together by circumstance, both of them are hurled into a discovery of what the true god desires of them…and of their people.
