Serpent's Kiss by Thea Harrison Also in this series: Dragon Bound, Oracle's Moon
Series: Elder Races #3
Published by Berkley Sensation on October 4, 2011
Genres: Paranormal Romance, Vampires
Narrator: Sophie Eastlake
Length: 13 Hours and 15 Mins
Pages: 336
Format: Audiobook
ISBN: 0425244407
In the latest Novel of the Elder Races, a Queen on the brink of sanity has no one to rely on except the Wyr warrior whose conviction is every bit as strong as his passion.
In order to save his friend's life, Wyr sentinel Rune Ainissesthai made a bargain with Vampyre Queen Carling—without knowing what she would ask from him in return. But when Rune attempts to make good on his debt, he finds a woman on the edge.
Recently, Carling's Power has become erratic, forcing her followers to flee in fear. Despite the danger, Rune is drawn to the ailing Queen and decides to help her find a cure for the serpent's kiss—the vampyric disease that's killing her.
With their desire for each other escalating just as quickly as Carling's instability spirals out of control, the sentinel and the Queen will have to rely on each other if they have any hope of surviving the serpent's kiss.
Serpent’s Kiss kicks off when our hero, a Wyr sentinel Roan, has been called into the favor he owed the Vampyre Queen Carling. He has no idea what this favor will be or what it will cost him, but his friend and boss is NOT happy, Dragos doesn’t want him to do this but Roan always lives up to his word. So he goes to visit the Queen Carling. Carling is dying, she has lived longer than most, and she goes into “phases” and she feels herself starting to slip away and she knows its only a matter of time before her mind is gone. But when the Wyr Roan arrives, her senses go into red alert, because he is making her feel things she hasn’t felt for centuries and her emotions are out of wack. But with Roan’s help, Carling is given hope that there might be a cure for the disease plaguing her. But there is more danger than Carling and Roan know, and soon they might be on the run from their own people, but will they be able to find the cure in time….
It has been SOOO long since I have picked up a book by this author, or gotten back into this series. I just adored books one and two, so I figured it was time to get back into the Elder Races and WHEW….this one was dang good y’all. I really had a blast with it, I will say that it wasn’t what I was expecting to be honest which is a very good thing. But I did have some issues with the book.
My main issue that really cost some enjoyment of the story is how the heroine treats the hero in the beginning. Now I love strong heroines, I really really do. However, the hero, he is a fun one but a keeper. And I will say that Carling is a bit abusive to the heroine in the beginning, and this almost had me DNF this one because this really bothers me in romance and it honestly didn’t make sense why she was doing it and it was never explained, just a “random” occurance, nope, not in my book. So I really had a hard time liking Carling for the first half of the book, because of a couple of scenes in the beginning that turned me off her character.
However despite my reservations about the heroine, this author won me over eventually with her character. I actually really liked Roan and Carling together. They just fit perfectly, and Roan seems to understand Carling and what she needs from him. There are so many precious moments between them that had me laughing and swooning.
She said, “Kneel.”
She felt his surprise as her command jolted through him.
But then he did a thing that surprised her in return. He raised his eyebrows, gave her that easygoing insouciant grin of his and said, “Okey-dokey.”
With a flourish he went gracefully down on one knee in front of her.
What was this? He was down on the floor, his powerful broad shoulders dipped in subjugation. He even bowed his head. He gave every appearance of submission, and performed flawlessly to the letter of her order, but . . .
Deep in the axis of that fierce remarkable soul, the alpha male still reigned. She circled behind him and stepped close to his broad shoulders to put her lips near his ear. She whispered, “You’re not really kneeling inside.”
He cocked his head to look at her over one shoulder. His reckless gaze laughed at her. He whispered back, “You didn’t order me to do that. It would require an entirely different bargain for me to really kneel to you.”
Caught in the unknown riddle, she asked, “What bargain would that require?”
He gave her a slow smile. “You must give me a kiss.”
The sleek arch of her eyebrows lifted. “Just a kiss?”
“Just that.”
“The bargain is struck,” she said.
“And answered,” he growled.
Carling put a hand onto his shoulder as she prowled to stand in front of him. Then she slid her hands along the warm sun-bronzed skin of his jaw. She tilted his handsome wild face up to hers and he let her. Then she bent to place her cool lips on his hot carved lips.
Her body moved in the impulse to breathe again, and she allowed it. His masculine Power enveloped her, and it was spiced with sensuality and warmth as it caressed her like a sun-filled breeze.
She lifted her head and stared down at him. She narrowed her eyes.
She said, “You’re still not really kneeling inside.”
Tap, tap, went her bare foot.
He cocked an eyebrow.
“What else did you expect, Carling?” he replied. “That wasn’t a real kiss.”
Yep this is one of the very first moments that they meet and yeah SWOON and boy does this hero know how to work the heroine or what??? The majority of their interactions are so addicting and I quickly became swept away in their story. We see them travel through history together, we see them solve a mystery surrounding Carling’s disease and we have a betrayer and of course some badass moments with Dragos…of course because it wouldn’t be an Elder Races novel without Dragos and Pia right?
I found this story to be a thrilling and edgy paranormal romance with enough light humor to balance it out just right. There is time traveling, adventure, intrigue, sexy times that are guaranteed to make you swoon and enough romance to make you curl your toes!!
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