Bond of Blood

Very good. As usual for a Gellis, it's as much about politics (of the time of Stephen) as it is a romance about Cain and Leah. There's a lot of misunderstandings, and suppression of comments, but it's not, strictly speaking, a misunderstanding trope. More "I am not worthy" plus mistrust. Leah is

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totally on Cain's side, as no one ever has been before; he can't believe it, so is constantly looking for plots and schemes in what she says (not without reason, her connections are entirely untrustworthy). Leah also had never had anyone, except her mother, trust or care for her, and her experience of men has been limited but bad - an abusive father, mostly. She can't believe Cain cares about her for herself at all. And all this plays out against plots and politics, assassination plans and years-long schemes to steal land and foment rebellion. Very good, and had me crying at several points. More Gellis, please (yes, the more stories in this bundle). Oh, minor note - there are quite a few scannos and mis-formatted bits - I need to check if that's how it came or if I messed stuff up in calibre (I forget if I changed formats). For instance, all the en-dashes disappeared - a lot of "II..." when there should have been "I - I...", and dosed for closed, and the like. Never quite threw me out of the story, but distracting at best.

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