Description

In a gripping dystopian romance perfect for fans of The Last of Us and The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, comes a standalone tale of survival, sacrifice, and love worthy of the ultimate risk.

Society is entirely dominated by one ruthless corporation, Caerus, an entity that secures control by strategically encouraging catastrophic debts among the impoverished lower classes.

Inesa struggles to survive alongside her brother, scraping together a meager living by running a taxidermy shop in a ruined, half-submerged town. Unknown to Inesa, their cruel, neglectful mother has amassed enough debt to force one of her own children into Caerus’s gruesome televised entertainment known as the Lamb’s Gauntlet—a spectacle where unfortunate debtors are hunted down and publicly killed.

Melinoë, a meticulously engineered assassin working for Caerus, is tasked with hunting down these sacrificial Lambs. Trained to perfection through neural tinkering and physical alterations, Melinoë is a feared and admired killer whose cold brutality and striking beauty have never let her fail a mission.

When Inesa discovers that her own mother has offered her life up as repayment, her initial despair quickly turns into fierce determination. With years of gritty survival experience and guidance from her brother, a skilled hunter himself, she believes there might be a small chance she can overcome the Gauntlet and survive.

To Melinoë, capturing Inesa represents a chance at redemption after an unusual emotional breakdown captured during her previous broadcasted hunt. Though Melinoë excels at ruthless tasks, she secretly battles haunting memories and growing doubts about her lethal purpose.

As Inesa and Melinoë navigate the danger-ridden wasteland in a deadly chase, both begin to question their fundamental beliefs: Inesa wonders if mere survival is truly enough, while Melinoë hopes she might be capable of more than just violence.

And despite everything, both begin to realize a shocking truth: they might actually be falling in love.