Lies of Lena by Kylie Snow

Here is a summary with spoilers for Lies of Lena by Kylie Snow

As a child, Lena and her mother were forced to run. Her mother had to teach Lena not to use her magic, as mages are hated and hunted. As a child, Lena accidentally used her magic, and now the two are on the run. Her mom, Minerva, found them a place in the Outer Ring of Otacia, ruled by the feared King Ulric La’Run and the loved Queen Ryia.

Years later, the two have set their lives up, and Minerva has set up a shop where she uses her magic, but mixes it in with healing elixirs and a bake shop, and Lena makes the deliveries. Every day, Lena is allowed to go into the Middle Circle to make deliveries for two hours. One morning, Lena goes to make her deliveries and a girl comes and bullies her, and in the process breaks some elixirs and eats some of the deliveries. Lena surprises the girl, grabs her knife, and puts it to the girl’s throat. A young man arrives, clearly from the Middle Circle, and Lena is worried she is going to get in trouble. Instead, he saw everything and is on her side. He offers to help her with the deliveries while Lena goes back home to replace the ones that were broken. While worried when she gets home that he is going to steal the rest of the items, the boy actually arrives at her house and sincerely just wants to help them. He introduces himself as Quill Callon. Lena and Quill finish the orders together, and at the end of the day Lena asks if they can meet again and wants him to train her in combat; Quill agrees.

Lena is excited that she now has a friend, as she has secluded herself quite a bit as a child. Things seem to be looking up. Even more so when the next day the Outer Ring gets a visit from Queen Ryia. She comes to visit the city, and it seems that she makes eye contact with Lena. Even more, at the market she goes straight for Lena and Minerva’s stall and buys everything. The next week, Quill comes and starts training her. Lena wants to know more about him though, and he is being very closed off. Worse, Lena starts to see her neighbors being outed as mages and being sent out to live in the woods.

As their training goes on, they get closer. Quill decides to take Lena out on a date rather than train one day. Though on their way out, they run into a group of men that look at Lena wrong, and Quill stands up for her before they leave. Later, when the two are making out in the woods and are about to go further, the men arrive and start to make crude comments about doing things to Lena. Quill kills them all and gets injured in the process. Lena gets him to her house and heals him. After he leaves, Lena decides that she wants to learn magic, though for only one reason: to know how to make a contraceptive brew, which her mom quickly finds out about.

The next week, Quill doesn’t show up to their usual training and Lena gets scared. She goes as far as to think that the men somehow found him. She decides to go out and look for him and runs into some of the men again. Quill shows up and has to defuse the situation, though it is already too late because Lena got badly injured. After Quill helps heal her, Lena invites Quill to a dance the next week and he says that he will be there. Soon, Quill sends Lena a dress to wear and then picks her up for the dance. By the end of the night, the two have sex, but Lena is still upset because he is still holding on to secrets, especially when he admits that his family and friends don’t know about her.

Lena and her mom decide to start working on an invisibility elixir so she can follow Quill home to find out why he is keeping secrets. Though as she follows him, she gets close to the castle, gets caught, and is sent to the prisons. That night, Lena is visited by Kayin, a woman who keeps showing up in her dreams. Kayin tells her that her time is almost coming and to hold on a bit longer. Soon, a guard comes to get Lena for her trial. She gets taken to the Queen and the Prince for her trial. The Prince is Silas La’Rune, and to her shock, Silas is actually the man she loves, Quill. Not wanting to talk to the prince, she asks the Queen to be escorted home. A guard named Torrin is the one who is assigned to do so. Torrin talks to her on the way home and says that he is a friend of Silas’s, and he says that he has known about Lena for some time now. He also warns her that she should be careful practicing her magic and to close her blinds when practicing. Lena is now scared on top of being betrayed, knowing that a king’s guard knows she is a mage.

A week later, Silas shows up to talk to her. After a talk about love, the two get back together, though they both realize they only have a year to be with each other before Silas will have to marry a princess. Months go by, and the two fall more and more in love. They continue to date, and every week Silas tries to tell her that he will find a way for them to get married, while Lena knows she can’t because she still hasn’t told him about being a mage. One night, she gets another visit from Kayin in her dream. She tells Lena to go visit the guard Torrin. The next morning, Torrin is waiting for her. Torrin tells her that he grew up in a city called Ames, a city for mages, but he was sent by a seer to be a spy. He was sent because the seer was told Silas will be the decider of the fates for the mages, though they aren’t sure how. But now that he has met Lena, he also knows that she is somehow part of it as well, but Torrin tells her she can’t tell Silas about being a mage.

It has now been a year of blissful dating between Silas and Lena, but it is time for Silas to be introduced to his kingdom as Crown Prince. Lena is proud to see the man he becomes. Later that day, he comes to visit the Lower Circle, where he invites her to the ball. Lena gets to dance with him on his birthday. Later, she dances with Torrin and is surprised to find that she thinks Torrin is handsome. The problem with that thought is Torrin can read thoughts, and when she had that thought, Torrin was in her mind. He told her not to worry about it because he knows she is in love with Silas. In return, Lena says she wants space and no longer wants to be near Torrin. Though that night, Lena has another dream with Kayin telling her she needs to find Torrin because everything is about to change. When Lena wakes, the news has spread: the Queen has been assassinated.

Lena finds Torrin, and he tells her that Silas and she are soul-tied, which is why she feels so connected with him. Torrin tells her that they need to leave soon, especially because he now admits that for months he has also been hearing Kayin in his head, and he is starting to not trust her. She sneaks in to see Silas and comfort him. Lena learns that the Queen was killed by her lady’s maid, Amatta, who was also a mage. For the first time in his life, Silas feels hatred so strong that he feels a need to take a life.

The next morning, at the public square, Amatta is brought forth for her public execution. The King announces that all witches that are found will now be killed rather than banished. Silas then burns Amatta alive. Lena and her mom, Minerva, decide they have to leave with Torrin. Lena wants to say goodbye to Silas, though she has to do so without telling him that she is leaving for good, which hurts her heart. When she gets back from saying goodbye, her magic comes to her in full force in the form of ice, which is quite rare. They then decide to burn the house down with two other bodies in it to make it look like they died, and then the three run away to the city of mages.

Fast forward five years. Lena is in Ames and has been growing and learning. She has new friends, Elowen and Merrick. She thought she had Torrin as a friend, though he left about a year ago without a word and hasn’t been seen since. Lena later finds out that Torrin was suggested to leave by the town leaders, as they saw him start to have feelings toward Lena, and they all know that she is soul-tied to Silas. Lena feels sad when she learns this because she just wants a friend, especially since that is a part of her old life, and especially because her true love, Silas, has been married for a year now.

The city of Ames has been untouched for years, but they are then attacked, and right at the front of the attack is Silas. Lena sees that Silas is about to get injured, so she goes to protect him, though right after she does that, Silas grabs her and puts her in cuffs that shut her magic down. Silas looks at her with surprise and disdain. His men start rounding up all the other mages and eventually bring out the town leader. Silas goes to him trying to find out information about a weapon. When he doesn’t give it, Silas stabs him. Lena runs to him, and as he is dying, he names Lena the new Supreme and tells her to take care of their people. Lena is surprised at the new weight on her shoulders, but also saddened that the rumors are true. Silas’s name, the Killer of Witches, is indeed accurate.

Lena and her people are taken prisoner, where she meets a soldier named Roland. He likes to tease her, and Lena finds him somewhat kind. Lena is taken to Silas so he can interrogate her about the weapon, during which he chokes her, and the only reason he stops is when she says the name “Quill.” Silas sends her back to the prison and tells her he will find a way to get the information out of her eventually. Later that night, soldiers break into Lena’s cell and abuse her, and one of them rapes her. Meanwhile, Silas is with his wife, and all he can think about is Lena, which makes him feel guilty. So when his wife falls asleep, he decides to go down and talk to Lena, which is when he finds her passed out and his soldiers harming her. He grabs Lena and locks the men up. He then gets Elowen and Merrick to come and heal her and, in turn, goes and kills the soldiers who harmed Lena. When Lena wakes, she panics because she is in Silas’s room, and she believes that Silas is the one who ordered the attack thanks to his last parting words, though Merrick confirms that is not accurate.

Silas decides he still has a lingering love for Lena and wants to let her go and be free. Lena refuses to go unless her people can be free as well. Silas then comes up with a plan. He, his wife, and a few of his men will leave with all of the mages. Lena will create a distraction, Silas will get the witches out, and Lena will lead them to a city she was told about full of witches. Lena points out that for Silas, this is committing treason. Silas says that for him, he is seeing this as an opportunity to team up with the witches and overthrow his father. In return, he will make his kingdom one where the witches can live freely. Lena wants to believe him but knows it will take some convincing.

The plan starts. Lena distracts the guards using her fire magic, which she developed in the past few years thanks to her rage. Roland is also there helping her out, and at one point the two end up kissing to try and distract and hide themselves from some guards. They eventually all group together, and everyone runs with Lena in charge. For days, they trek the mountains until they finally make it to the city, where they are tentatively let in because Silas and some of his men are there. They explain why they are there and what they need. Silas pays them a large sum to start making weapons for his men and for the mages, and everyone is then given a week. Silas and Lena decide to take that week and train their people. During this time, Lena struggles with her feelings toward Roland, as she finds him attractive, especially when he flirts with her, but she knows that her soul-tie is Silas.

It is finally time to start heading out and begin their battle. The night before, Lena sits over a ledge to think and gather her thoughts. Silas comes to join her. She tells him that she is proud of everything that he has done while she has been gone, giving the Outer Ring people a chance, hot water, more supplies, and so much more. Silas leaves because he can’t take Lena’s kindness. As he is walking away, Lena hears a voice she hasn’t heard in a long time: Kayin’s. She tells Lena that “we have work to do.”