Holy Bloodlines

Elyseans are so wise… Elyseans are so beautiful…. Elyseans are divine… Elyseans are power-hungry assholes with a god complex. Yes, I said it. Sue me and bring out your pitchforks. Unfortunately for me, the deadly Elysean Trials are right around the corner. Despite my unpopular opinion of them and anything Olympian-gods related, when they unleash their strange blue birds to select mortals around the country as candidates, one of them chooses me. Naturally, I politely tell them to shove it, but that's the thing about Elyseans: they're not used to taking no for an answer. So, together with my legal guardian, they force me to go to their trials just two days shy of my eighteenth birthday-and for what? A chance to attend the Academy of Divine Light and Beauty. A chance to become Elysean… What a joke. They can keep their Academy and their magic, but I will finish their trials because I have no other choice. I will survive these monsters disguised as gods because my freedom has never been closer. My own kind can't stand me, but that's nothing new. The Elyseans despise me-especially Shade, a descendant of Hades, who commands darkness with a wave of his hand and is sinfully beautiful, even when he's reminding me of how perfectly powerless against them I am. But the more I get to know him, the harder it gets to ignore who he really is, and the more impossible it gets not to give in to my attraction for him. The deeper into the trails I go, the more I learn, and the more I realize that Elyseans are not the perfect god-like people the world paints them to be. Worst of all, my past might not be quite like I remember, either… Intended for mature listeners.

I thought they built those walls around their cities to say that they are better than us. Special. Gods. I was wrong. The Elyseans have always thought themselves better than us mortals. At least, that's what they want the whole world to think. I believe it-until I complete the Elysean Trials they force me in and attend the Academy of Divine Light and Beauty. Until I meet a real Olympian goddess, and she finally sheds light on the gods' biggest secret, and it's worse than I could have ever imagined. Turns out, there's a purpose to the Elysean Trails. There's a reason why they exist and why they choose mortals to bring to their Academy. A very good reason, just not the one the world knows. And once again, I find myself at the center of it. Between magic suddenly bursting out of me, training every day with the goddess of the hunt herself, and the cutest little pup in the world choosing me as her master, I have very little time to sit still and think. Shade is there, like always, keeping me grounded, and making it all bearable. Despite being worked to death, I actually enjoy my life for once. I am happier than I've ever been... Until I accidentally leave him on the floor, unable to breathe, and nearly destroy the Void completely. Everything spirals out of control so fast. Shade said once that the gods created us in their image, so they're just the same as us. Unfortunately for me, the more secrets I uncover about who I am and who they are, the more I realize that he is absolutely right. For mature listeners.

A year ago, I was dragged into what I thought was hell against my will-the Daedalus Palace in the Elysean city of Idaea. Turns out that was just a place, but there's an actual hell here, so now I'm going in there, too. This time, though? Death is pretty much guaranteed, and I'm going in willingly. But if I'm lucky and I somehow survive, I'll get to say that I spent my nineteenth birthday in the Underworld. For mature listeners.

Welcome to the Elysean Academy of Divine Light and Beauty, where darkness lurks in every corner, and secrets just might cost you your life… I never wanted to have anything to do with Elyseans, descendants of the Olympian gods. When I'm forced to participate in their deadly trials, I also learn that not everything is as it looks, and my past might just be very different from what I remember. So when I complete their trials, and they offer me an invitation to the Academy, I do the unthinkable and say yes. The plan is simple-find the man who did something outrageous to me when I was five years old, get out of the city of gods, and never look back. If only it were that simple... The Academy is full of wonders I hate to admit that I love. I make new friends and new enemies who haunt me in the real world and the dream realm. Most importantly, Shade is right here, just as dark and as full of secrets, disappearing for days at a time before he comes back covered in blood and grime. Despite how things ended between us last time, I can't keep him away when he's always there. Always asking me to let him help me. Always ready to pick me up when I fall. Eventually, I have no choice but to accept. With each new month at the Academy, I learn more about everything the Elyseans keep from the outside world. I always believed that they built their walls so high to show that they're better than us, but the truth appears to be much different. Worse yet, the reason why all of us, every student at the Academy, mortal and Elysean, are being trained to fight every day might just explain everything I've been missing-and it's the secret that's going to change my life forever. Intended for mature listeners.