"Here, in this sweltering cell, far from her people and her land, she did not feel like a dragon. For the first time in a long time, she felt like a girl. It terrified her. Because there was nothing in the world more vulnerable to be than a girl."

"She was a dragon. She was a prince. She was a woman. It was the last that scared them most of all."

I rated the first and second book in this series 4 stars despite having my issues with them sometimes, but this one was pretty close to perfect! I feel like both Lada and Radu really came into their own here and there was definitely a lot more action and a lot less of them sitting around waffling over whether they should do something and ~what would Mehmed think~ and such [I really hate Mehmed jsyk]. Overall just a really great book and I'm very happy with the ending. If you have read the first one and maybe struggled with it a little bit then I would definitely recommend you continue because this book is worth it!

Easily one of the best conclusions to a series that I have ever read

my heart is aching because I love these characters and their arcs and this ending so much and I miss them already.

Hmm, I'm having a hard time deciding what to rate this one. I blew threw this and [b:Now I Rise|40669906|Now I Rise (The Conqueror's Saga #2)|Kiersten White|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1530288861s/40669906.jpg|42367441] in like 3 days, and while I definitely thought Now I Rise was the superior book, this had a lot of redeeming qualities for me.

First, Radu. He's kind of trash in the second book. Love him as a character but damn if he doesn't make some terrible decisions. He absolutely redeems himself here though. Finally atoning for all the weak moments in the first and second books.

Lada: I was kind of disappointed with her! She was SO clever and nasty in the first two; she seemed really... defeated in this one. Walks into a lot of traps. I absolutely LOVE novels where the main characters are constantly trying to out maneuver each other (the TV series Reign and [b:The Pillars of the Earth|5043|The Pillars of the Earth (Kingsbridge, #1)|Ken Follett|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1388193707s/5043.jpg|3359698] are great examples of this), and I feel like that was a lot more essential to the plot of the second book but not this one.

Mehmed is still terrible. Love to hate that guy. Kinda felt a little bad for him there at the end but meh.

I also loved how the various romances were handled. They weren't overdone, and I think this book could have been easily ruined with a lot of sex. It would have taken away from the dark and bloody conflict which is of course the point of the story. I would have loved to have seen Lada and Bogdan's relationship developed a little further, however.

Overall a strong finish to a compulsively readable series.

LOVED LOVED LOVED.

Phenomenal.
Kiersten White surpassed all my expectations and firmly, /firmly/ placed this trilogy as one of my all-time favs. I am speechless.

I am here for this series in all shapes and forms. Lada is a genuine badass that created her power when despite the lack of help and those that tried to stop her. Radu is the most precious thing under this sun and deserves only good things to happen to him. I loved this trilogy. At no point in time was I bored. I took a long time to finish this because I didn't want it to end.

I finally got the time to get around to reading this final book of the series. I love books based on historical figures...even better when they are changed as they are in these. Using real people and scenarios were used yet changed to align to make a great and interesting story. I loved the whole series and this book gave the perfect ending.

I was really worried I would hate the ending to this series, but I didn't! Things wrapped up in a satisfying way that I didn't see coming.

Also a big kudos to Kiersten White for keeping the events in much of this series quite historically accurate. Reading the wikipedia pages for all of the events in the series after the fact, I was floored with how much of the narrative was actually based on true events. Obviously some liberties were taken, but DO NOT READ THE WIKIPEDIA PAGE ABOUT ANYBODY IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO SPOIL THE EVENTS OF THE BOOKS IN THIS SERIES.

I was super tempted to research people that were in the story throughout the entire series, but it will ruin the books for you so definitely don't!

This series was very enjoyable. The ending was not what I expected, and I liked that very much.