The Serpent's Crown

Her years as a novice hardly prepared the plain and pious Juliana de Charnais to become the wife of Guérin de Lasalle, the Lord of Parthenay. A former mercenary with a formidable pedigree, Lasalle is a man singularly averse to conventions secular and spiritual. When a messenger arrives from the Holy Land and entices Lasalle back into a life he had abandoned, Juliana embarks on a perilous journey only to find herself trapped in intrigues as byzantine as they are deadly between the Lusignans, a family rumored to be descended from the half-serpent Lady Mélusine, and their rivals, the Ibelíns. On Cyprus, the island of Aphrodite, Juliana and Lasalle find that loyalty, like love, comes in many guises, and that duty and honor require of them a terrible sacrifice. Set in 13th-century France and Cyprus, The Serpent's Crown continues the story that began in The Sixth Surrender.