Seven Names for a Sleeping Heir

Synopsis

In the southern empire, a noble house survives only when its dying head whispers the family's True Name to a single witness. If the chosen heir sleeps before hearing it, the name is lost and the house is dissolved. Sirin of the Hollow Spring, the last unburned Name-Witch of the ice frontier, is summoned under imperial protection to keep Lord Alderic's exhausted heir awake while the lord delays his choice. Sirin has seven wakefulness syllables, each worth one hour and impossible to reuse on the same person. She can hear the True Name humming in noble throats, but she cannot speak or write it without burning her tongue to ash. On arrival, she discovers the impossible: House Hollow Bell's True Name is not humming in the dying lord, but in Lucien, the spare son. As Casimir, the official heir, survives revolts, impossible tests, and his father's grief, he begins courting Sirin as a bargain and slowly becomes the one person who refuses to force her truth from her. With every syllable spent, Sirin must choose whether to preserve her monastery, save one brother, doom the other, or expose a law of inheritance that may already be broken.

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