Before she was Queen, she was a nobody trying to escape. Bitter bird in a court of snakes, Sick of eating tarts and cakes... In a court of gilded mirrors, gilded smiles, and gilded lies, I am an insignificant nothing. I mimic the emptiness of the velvet-swathed nobles dancing with me beneath teardrop chandeliers, but I want more. When my father condemns me to a foul betrothal in another city, I crave at least one taste of freedom, a single adventure to savor before I am boxed up into nothingness. For one night, I escape to the carnival. Seeking to unravel some secret - to unveil the mechanisms behind the enchantment - I sneak behind one of the rides, only to find... An open door. Inside a small room, on time-eroded planks, kneels a beautiful boy scarcely older than I, cranking a cylinder to keep the ride's gears spinning. I fall into a little bit of agony, a little bit of wish. And as the wind brushes sand across my toes in my slippers, the boy glances up. I swear my breath stops. But my life? This is where my life begins. Look inside to discover how a nobody became a queen...

Born in Texas but somehow having escaped without the accent, Sonya Lano currently lives in Prague, Czech Republic with two cats and a bunch of dust balls, hairballs, fur balls, spiders, story manuscripts, dreams, chocolate, books, and whatever else is hanging around her flat. Her full-time day job testing software pays the bills while her nights are (mostly) filled with living in other worlds.