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The Blood Gift: 2 (Blood Gift Duology)

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I nod where Bastien’s applying pressure to his thigh with a square of medgauze. “The shots were clean. They missed your femoral artery and the gauze has regeneration salve. You can get over them now.” Moreover, how the hell did the tables get turned on me? How did this become my interrogation as much as it was his? I sit in a mountainside cafe, sipping a godsawful microstate whiskey, and watch my targets across the room. There’s twelve in total—eight women and four men. They’re in a reserved section roped off from the public, having a party. An ebony-skinned woman in her mid-fifties with flawless, gene-manipulated beauty and striking gray eyes that remind me ruthlessly of a certain other bitch I’ve been trying not to think about raises her glass and starts the speech for a toast. I mark the subtle elegance about Edryssa Cyphir—my desired target—and also the gruffness that makes it clear she could handle herself in most fights. Probably any fight. He catches me around my waist and skims featherlight fingers up my spine. I shiver again, and this time whatever swagger I think I’ve got gets smashed to pieces because I don’t even care about my reaction anymore other than to press my body closer against him, remembering that I was formerly horny, and pray to the gods that if he did read my message, he’s game, even if that’s not the reason he turned up.

Since discovering the treachery of Mareen’s Tribunal Council and revealing her blood-gift to save her Praetorian squad, Ikenna has become a fugitive with a colossal bounty on her head. I jump up and walk to the salon to open the door. “There’s no way you got my ping and responded to it that fast,” I say to Reed, who’s looking at me with a stupefied expression. Ikenna.” The word of caution comes from Reed. He’s stepped up to my side and holds himself stiff. He and I have had the argument about approaching Edryssa no less than five times. He’s of Grandfather’s type of thinking. But the team took a vote, and his opinion lost. I lower my knife a fraction toward his thigh. I let its tip graze the exposed pink, bloody, shredded muscle with splinters of bone stabbing through. He hollers again. “Make her accept.”I do understand that she wanted this to be a trilogy, the publisher wanted a duology so she had to combine her ideas for books 2 and 3 into one book. Honestly some of those ideas that were originally for book 3 could've been dropped in favor of fleshing out some other plots. I still had questions that didn't get answered because they were breezed past for other plots. More people needed to die! The deaths we had I feel like we didn't really get to know those characters well/weren't following Ikenna around them long enough for them to have big impact. Bah. I was disappointed after such a strong first book. The first book was a journey; this was just Super Ikenna going from place to place communicating in silent glances with everyone around her. I re-read The Blood Trials before I jumped into this just to be refreshed and immersed in this world and ready for one of my most anticipated reads of 2023. And I have to say it was not a 5-star read and at the conclusion, I have unresolved feelings. This does not mean I did not enjoy the book, I did, immensely! But I was a tad disappointed because I had hyped myself up so high for this as Blood Trials was one of my top 5 reads of 2022. Reed rubs his forehead. It’s a simple gesture that shows he’s tired, and for some reason, it pisses me off further. He drags in a breath, pinching his nose. My treacherous lips twitch again, this time almost twisting into a smile, because I’m pretty sure he did that same exact thing while being exasperated with me for something while I was his neo and he was my transition officer during the trials.

Someone please explain how we got here!?!?!? Because you can't tell me that NE Davenport fit all of that into one book. It just aint no way. At first I didn't see what everyone was talking about regarding the pacing because the book was going smoothly. Then all hell broke loose.There is no me and you, I almost say to be ornery, but know it’s an utter lie. One that tastes like acid on my tongue—so unlike his tongue, which had just been in my mouth—and sears my throat when I try to spit it out. “You got me home off the mountain,” I say lamely. “I owed you a debt. I was repaying it.” Plot-wise, this is a complete departure from book one, which makes sense considering where we left off. There's no mystery left. Ikenna and her team are hellbent on getting rid of the corruption within Mareen. Before they can do that, they need to take care of the Blood Emperor, who is once more terrorizing the planet. It's a very straightforward plot of "how are we going to defeat the bad guys", but it's fairly fast-paced and overall entertaining enough. And I mostly liked the characters. But a lot of this doesn't feel like it's the end of a series. This is reinforced by the end of the book, which basically implies there's a whole new story waiting to happen. Things are set up by the author that never get any payoff. For example, the book starts off with Ikenna trying to broker an alliance with someone on the wrong side of the law. She demands soldiers and weapons, only she doesn't really do much with either of them afterwards, or with the alliance in general. There's maybe one or two off-hand mentions, and that's it, which makes me wonder why the author bothered to include it at all. It also leans a lot more fantasy than science fiction compared to The Blood Trials. Reed clears his throat. A light pink tints his cheeks. I blink, not believing what I glimpse. Is he—no way am I seeing a blush on Darius Reed. You’re not getting around my request that easy,” he says. “This doesn’t go further until we have an actual proper conversation about what I asked.”

The first has to do with Ikenna. Look, I get that she was always going to be special as our main character. She has the Blood Gift and all of that. But her level of special receives like three upgrades over the course of this book, and I guess it's not something I expect to see if we're talking about an adult fantasy. This much Chosen One-ness is something I see more often within YA, and it irked me. I also had trouble buying into her supposed development. One of my biggest issues with the first book was how little she thought things through, and how she kept deciding that people were murderers based on very flimsy "evidence". Only now I'm supposed to believe that she has become some sort of strategic mastermind.She bends toward me, her lips stopping a hairsbreadth from my left ear. “I think you underestimate yourself. Verne didn’t foresee holding so much sway over the rest of the world and its workings when he first sought to thwart the Blood Emperor either. Yet, after he succeeded, that is precisely what happened. All of Iludu, save the Accacian Empire, worshipped him and lauded him and were ripe to hand him anything he requested. Especially if he couched it as being for the good of the Minor Continent and for the sake of holding off any renewed war by the Blood Emperor. Let’s say you are more successful than even he was and you actually manage to kill Nkosi this time around. You’ll be a goddess among men to the whole of the Minor Continent, perhaps even Accacia. It’ll submit to whatever you ask of it, and then you will be able to give me what I seek.”

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