The Road of Bones by Demi Winters

Silla Nordvig has been living with her father happily—traveling and moving—but she loved the life they had. One day, they are stopped by guards who claim that the Queen of Iseldur wants Silla, and the guards are there to take her to Sunnavik. Her father, panicked, fights for her, but the soldiers capture him and then tell Silla that he is not her real father. Her father fights harder, kills the soldiers, but gets stabbed himself. He dies in Silla’s arms, telling her to go and find safety.

Thus starts Silla’s journey in a haze. She is accompanied by an unnamed girl that no one else can see—just in her mind. Because of the haze of guilt and confusion Silla is in, she sleeps on the side of the road and is awoken by a band of robbers who want to kill her, but something ends up protecting her.

Meanwhile, we’re introduced to a female guard, Skraeda, who’s had a great life—until royals found out what she could do. She now has new orders: to find a girl with a scar by her eye and bring her to the Queen.

We are also introduced to the Bloodaxe Crew. Leading them is Reynir Galtung, a ruthless leader who has no mercy. Along with him are Jonas, Gunnar, Hekla, and Illias. They are one of the most merciless groups. They have been given a new task—one that will give Reynir and his group a lot of money. They will set off the next morning. After a long day of traveling, they find a stowaway in their wagon.

Back with Silla, she is trying to find passage to a particular city—one that her father said is safe for her. In a tavern, she overhears a group of people preparing to go somewhat in the direction she needs to go. She decides to slip into their wagon and join them. Partway through the journey, she realizes her mistake and finds out she is with the Bloodaxe Crew. When she is discovered and her fate is in Ray’s hands, she says she just wants passage but will help them with their task. Ray is hesitant but lets her live for now.

Silla starts to make friends with all of them, even though she is lying to them at the same time. But her cooking wins many of the soldiers over. However, very quickly one of her secrets comes out—her real name, Silla. They all become hesitant of her again, and she has to work to gain their trust yet again.

All throughout the travels, Ray is trying to make it miserable for Silla in hopes she will just leave. One night, Silla does leave but ends up coming back and confronts Ray, saying she won’t be that easy to persuade to leave. Ray also notices a habit of Silla’s: she takes a leaf every night. Silla says it’s because she has headaches and this is what her father gave her. Ray says it is a drug, and she is addicted—that’s why she gets headaches. They are withdrawals. He tells her to be careful.

Skraeda, meanwhile, is still on the hunt for Silla. She collects information and believes she is just a few days behind the girl. But she gets a visit from the Queen herself, wanting an update. When Skraeda doesn’t have one, the Queen threatens her.

Meanwhile, Silla is still trying to get in the good graces of the Bloodaxe Crew—and more specifically, get them to take her to her final destination, even though it is a detour for them. Silla is also slowly falling for Jonas, even though the others in the group tell her not to. It will only cause heartbreak. It doesn’t stop the two from kissing.

Since she made the promise to help them just for partial passage, Ray takes her on her first mission. It is to visit his old guard friend, who has the book and information they need. Silla figures if she can help him get both things, maybe he’ll decide that was good work and take her to her final destination. So she tries hard to get it, including going in on a drinking game.

During the drinking game, she lets loose another of her secrets, and Ray tucks that information away until after they leave with the book and information. Even though Silla thought she did well, Ray confronts her about her lie and says he’ll never take her to her final destination—because she still has secrets.

That night, she seeks comfort from Jonas, and they finally sleep together. Jonas tells her they have to continue seeing each other in secret because Ray told him she was off-limits. She agrees and continues to work hard. She trains with the Bloodaxe Crew and is enjoying being with her newfound family, even if Ray looks at her angrily all the time.

Skraeda finally catches a break. She tracks Silla to a city, and when she visits the bar, someone tells her that Silla is traveling with the Bloodaxe Crew. They tell Skraeda exactly what city they are going to next.

Silla, feeling empowered with her training and her family, decides she needs help with one more thing—stopping the use of the leaf. Ray is the only one who knows about it, so she asks for his help as she realizes she is fully addicted at this point. She gives all the leaves to Ray.

She has a conversation with the girl that is with her. The girl says it will most likely be the last time they see each other and that Silla needs to come find her sister. That begins two days of her in a fever and a long time to heal. Even though it’s only the first part of the withdrawal, she is excited that she made that first hard step. Ray keeps the leaf a secret from the rest of the guard.

Silla and Jonas continue to grow closer together, and with her healing, she shares a tent with him. After Jonas shares personal stories about his life, Silla feels the need to share hers as well. She reveals to him that she is responsible for her mother’s death. When she was a child, an accident happened, but her mother said it was her, not Silla, and claimed that she had ash magic that lit up her hands. Her mother was stoned to death because of this, and Silla watched it all.

Jonas then says he killed his father because he was hurting his mom. While talking about this together, there is an attack. They rush out to defend, and Silla accidentally uses magic—her hands glow. She realizes it was her as a child, not her mother, and that the leaf has probably been suppressing her magic. She had no idea.

She keeps the magic to herself, but after the fight, Ray wants to know why Silla and Jonas were in the same tent together. Jonas admits his feelings for Silla, and it turns into a full-on fight between Jonas and Ray. No one stops them.

The next day, the group makes it to the next city and Jonas takes Silla in. She panics, though, when she sees the guard—Skraeda—so she tells Jonas she’ll catch up later, then proceeds to run away from Skraeda.

Skraeda tries to tell her she is going to take her to the Queen and to her sister, but Silla manages to run away—right into Jonas. Jonas saw a lot of things happen and realizes that Silla is still hiding secrets. He puts together that she must be important since the king is after her.

He gets Silla to safety and then starts to demand all her secrets come out. She tells him everything except for her true identity, which she only recently found out herself—along with the fact that it is not the king who wants her, rather the Queen.

Silla decides to tell Ray as well, so he can decide whether to kick her out or not. She doesn’t want to have her new family unprotected. The crew says they are on her side.

The next day, they continue on but are ambushed. They tell Silla to hide in the forest. While they are protecting her, Illias ends up dying to save her. Jonas is shocked that his little brother is gone and starts to have some serious feelings of anger toward Silla, even though she feels absolutely terrible.

She decides to go to Ray to tell him sorry, but he spits out that his biggest regret was bringing her to the crew. She then goes to Jonas to seek some comfort, but he has come up with a plan. He poisons Silla with the leaf and overdoses her on it.

Silla sees her sister again in her mind before she passes out. She wakes up in a cell where the commander is waiting for her. For days, she goes in and out, trying to kick the effects of the leaf.

Meanwhile, Ray figures out what happened to Silla and what Jonas did to her. He starts to feel regret, as he happens to like Silla and wants her back safely. He decides to go find her and save her.

Silla makes a friend in the cell who has been there for weeks. Silla worries about her fate. But the commander comes for her, starts to undress her, and also claims he wants to experiment on her and her hands.

Silla doesn’t want that. She fights back and ends up killing the commander. She runs away and runs right into Skraeda. She manages to get away once again and runs right into Ray. He apologizes for his words and promises to take her back to the rest of the group.

In an epilogue, the reader is introduced to Saga, the princess with a tortured mind. She is mindless and wandering, just trying to survive. She is part of the Volsik family, who once ruled until the Urkans killed her family and stole her throne. Now the Queen acts as a foster mother to her.

The Queen then requests a visit from Saga. She tells her she needs to start showing her face more—especially because she is expected to marry her son, Bjorn, soon when he turns fourteen.

When Saga is told to leave, she lurks close by and overhears the guards talking to the Queen. Her sister is still alive—and she escaped both the prison and the guard. Saga is shocked, believing her sister was dead.