Ivy runs a little overlooked plant shop in Brooklyn. Every plant she touches grows wildly—not just gardening talent, but the hidden power of Verdant Magic. Five years ago, the Convocation, the supreme authority of the magical realm, wiped out her family on false charges of treason. She is the sole survivor, suppressing her magic to live in hiding. Until Damian, a Convocation enforcer, uncovers her identity and gives her two choices: bind herself to him with a magical marriage pact for protection, or refuse and face certain death. Ivy agrees—not out of fear, but because being his bonded partner lets her enter the Convocation’s inner circle, where proof of her family’s massacre lies sealed in ancient archives. She steps into the underground magical city as the enforcer’s consort. Cold and distant in public, Damian secretly shields her from countless plots behind closed doors. An unexpected bond blooms between them within the chains of their pact. Then the High Elder jails her in the dungeon for treason. Rune stones seal away all her magic, yet Ivy awakens an older power deep beneath the ground—the ancient roots planted by her Verdant ancestors centuries ago, dormant but never dead. No longer waiting to be saved, she lets her power surge. Stone cracks open, emerald light spills from the crevices, vines burst through the walls, and flowers bloom all at once in the dark. The whole underground city glows anew, and the blight that plagued it ends forever. On the day their pact is dissolved, Damian stands before her. “What now?” Ivy places a seed in his palm. Vines sprout between his fingers and twist around his wrist. “This time, no terms, no contracts.” Her Brooklyn plant shop stays open as always. Behind its door lies a hidden passage veiled in vines—leading to the world she has reclaimed.
