Welcome to our tour stop on the Ally by Anna Banks' Blog Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours! Today we are hosting Anna Bank's next installment in the Nemesis series. Make sure you check out the excerpt and enter the giveaway! Enjoy and good luck!
Title: ALLY
Author: Anna Banks
Pub. Date: October 3, 2017
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Pages: 320
Formats: Hardcover, eBook
Find it: Amazon, B&N, iBooks, TBD, Goodreads
Author: Anna Banks
Pub. Date: October 3, 2017
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Pages: 320
Formats: Hardcover, eBook
Find it: Amazon, B&N, iBooks, TBD, Goodreads
Princess Sepora of Serubel and King Tarik of Theoria have formed an uneasy truce between their kingdoms since the deadly plague began to rip through Theoria. Since their feelings for each other are entangled in politics and power, they must use their own trusted resources to find common ground.But when traitors with powerful allies arise from unexpected places, Tarik and Sepora face challenges that will change both of their kingdoms forever. Will they learn whom to trust—including each other—in time to save their kingdoms, their relationship and even their lives?

The woman chuckles in
a way that suggests she knows exactly who I am, and exactly what the penalty
will be by keeping me here, but is not concerned in the least about any of
it—and is not impressed by the power I’d hoped to infuse into my tone. “You
must calm down, child,” she says soothingly. “No harm will come to you here.”
“Then why am I tied
up?” Not that being tied up actually hurts, but it does make one feel
particularly defenseless against any such harm. And it does make one feel like
a prisoner.
“The bonds are for
our safety, not yours, Princess.” She tinkers around closer to me now, almost
at the bedside. Her movements sweep the scent of roses into my nose. Roses, and
food. She is cooking something in here. Something that smells delicious. My
stomach growls in want, and the woman chuckles again. “I’m making lamb stew.
It’s a special recipe handed down through generations of my family. I’m sure
you’ll enjoy it.”
While the idea of
eating sounds glorious, I ignore her attempts at being kind. “You’re protecting
yourself from me? Whatever for?”
She is close now. I
hear her set something down upon perhaps a table next to my bed. “We understand
you’ve had the benefit of training with the Majai and your ability to Forge
weapons from nothing is well known. Aside from that, you tend to thrash about
when you receive treatment.”
My ability to Forge
weapons is not well known. Only those closest to me are privy to that
information, and I do not recognize this woman’s voice from a stranger’s at the
Bazaar. I feel bare and vulnerable, as though all my secrets have been
uncovered. I might as well be lying here naked. I must have been at one point;
the clothes I wear now cover the lengths of my legs and arms, cinching at my
ankles and wrists. This is not what I wore to bed however many nights ago.
Someone has changed me while I was unconscious.
“Why can’t I open my
eyes?” And did she just say treatment? Have I been mortally injured? I test my
jaw and find that it has mended well since I first found myself on the boat in
the River Nefari. Oh yes, the boat. I’ve been taken by the Pelusians. That is
where this woman’s slight accent comes from. If I put up such a fight as to be
wounded, I don’t remember at all. There are no bandages on my face, no cloths
wrapped tightly against my skin anywhere. Still, my eyes will not open.
Somehow, though, this doesn’t seem as important as before.
The woman clicks her
tongue in what she must think sounds like a comforting noise. “That’s it. Nice
and relaxed you’ll be soon.”
“Why? I do not want to
relax.” I’m aware that my arguments are abrupt and even childish, yet I can’t
quite get my bearings enough to offer more resistance.
“Ah, but the calming
serum we gave you will ensure that you are. It will help you rest during your
treatments.” Calming serum.
I’ve been kidnapped,
re-dressed, and drugged. This is sounding all too familiar. “I do not need to
be treated. I feel fine.” If arguing is the only way I have of being difficult,
so be it. Surely I should be difficult, for the principle of the thing. With or
without the calming serum. I can almost hear her smile when she says, “That’s a
silly thing to say. Everyone wants to be relaxed.” She is even closer now; I
feel her leaning over me. She tugs at the leather strap at my left hand, and
does the same to my other limbs, ensuring they are all secure. “Now, be very
still, Princess. I’m going to administer a needle to your right arm.” She
touches the crook of my arm then, tapping it with the pad of one finger. “This
vein here is your best, I think. You’ll feel a small pinch, I’m afraid. Oh, I
do wish you were still sleeping. You wouldn’t feel the pain of the cure if you
were sleeping.”
Pain. The way she
says it makes me wish I were sleeping, too. “Cure? What cure? Have I fallen
ill? Am I wounded?” Saints of Serubel, but why won’t she answer my questions? I
remember the giant man hovering over my bed in Theoria, the way his fist
connected with my mouth. I don’t remember any more harm done to me during my
bouts of consciousness. “If I’ve been injured, I’ve a right to know!” Not that
this woman cares about my rights, obviously. But perhaps if I can appeal to her
apparent caregiving nature . . .
“No!” she says,
gently brushing a bit of hair out of my face and tucking it behind my ear.
“You’re in perfectly good health, child. That lip of yours will heal in no
time. You’ll see.”
“Then what cure do
you speak of?” I’ve never heard of curing someone who wasn’t ill, and it’s at
this point that I begin to doubt I’m awake at all. This must be some sort of
vivid dream, which is why my eyes won’t open. I’m simply not ready to wake up
yet.
I’m ready to believe
this, that it’s a dream, until I feel her hand at my arm and the needle when it
pushes into my vein, startling me. After that I feel a liquid oozing into my
bloodstream. And the burn. It makes a scalding trail through my body, and I
imagine the gleaming molten liquid the silversmith in Serubel uses to shape
swords, and I cry out as the intensity increases and spreads everywhere. “I do
not need a cure,” I tell her, my stomach tightening with agony, “if I am not
ill!”
“This is not for any
ailment, child,” she says mildly. “This is the cure for Forging.” It is then
that I vomit all over myself.
NYT Bestselling YA author of The Syrena Legacy series: OF POSEIDON (2012), OF TRITON (2013), OF NEPTUNE (2014)Repped by rockstar Lucy Carson of the Friedrich Agency.I live with my husband and daughter in the Florida Panhandle. I have a southern accent compared to New Yorkers, and I enjoy food cooked with real fat. I can’t walk in high heels, but I’m very good at holding still in them. If you put chocolate in front of me, you must not have wanted it in the first place.Favorite Books:Shatter Me, Cinder, Linger, Shiver, Forever, Pushing the Limits, Unravel Me,Shadow and Bone, Enclave, Divergent, Candor, Graceling, Fire, The Hunger Games Trilogy, The Host, Most of James Patterson, and Janet Evanovich makes me laugh through my nose in an unfeminine sort of way.




Week One:
9/25/2017- a GREAT read- Review
9/26/2017- PaperTrailYA- Interview
9/27/2017- Owl Always Be Reading- Excerpt
9/28/2017- Reese's Reviews- Review
9/29/2017- Two Chicks on Books- Interview
Week Two:
10/2/2017- Little Red's Reviews- Review
10/3/2017- Lisa Loves Literature- Guest Post
10/4/2017- Take Me Away To A Great Read- Review
10/5/2017- YA Books Central- Interview
10/6/2017- Seeing Double In Neverland- Review
I loved the first book, and am excited to continue the story.
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