The Scorpion Queen

Printing with sprayed edges for a limited time!

UprootedmeetsChildren of Blood and Bonein this dark fantasy inspired by a Malian fairy tale about a disgraced girl who must serve a princess whose suitors are challenged to gruesome and impossible trials.

Deep within the imperial palace at Timbuktu, Amie has suffered a devastating loss. Once the daughter of a prosperous salt merchant Amies life was cruelly overturned in a matter of months. At sixteen, Amie now finds herself disinherited, framed for a scandalous crime, and forced to serve Princess Mariama of Mali . Her father, Emperor Sulyeman, has created a series of impossible trials for his daughter’s suitors. When they fail, he publicly boils them alive, littering Mariamas path to marriage with ninety-nine corpses.

At first, Amies life at court is drudgerythe chores are difficult, the servants despise her, and Princess Mariama is prone to mood swingsbut the more she learns about the princess’s circumstances, the closer the two girls become. Amie and her intended, Kader, plan to escape Timbuktu and make a new life far away from the shadow of death that has fallen upon the emperors court, but she finds herself increasingly drawn to the princess in ways she doesnt understand.

When a mysterious discovery forces her hand, she must choose between fleeing with the boy she loves or helping the princess to end the trials forever. Amie will need to draw on all of her strength and courage to make the perilous journey through the desert to seek the aid of an exiled god in a final, desperate attempt to take charge of her own destiny.