The world was never built to forgive blood.
On the plains beyond human walls, the Horned Kin endure by steel, scars, and a curse older than memory. Their king rules from horseback and firelight, his authority written into muscle and bone rather than law. Survival has always demanded sacrifice-but this time, the cost has a name.
Behind white stone walls, Astra worships purity. Its young king has inherited a throne that does not belong to him alone: councils watch his body as closely as his crown, and doctrine decides which desires may exist. To rule is to remain untouched. To be seen is to be judged.
Between these two kingdoms lies a curse carved into history by blood and ritual-a binding that demands kings, not mercy. Crown for crown. Blood for blood.
When war brings the Horned King to Astra's gates, the curse tightens. What begins as coercion becomes proximity. What begins as hatred refuses to remain clean. Neither king is allowed freedom, and neither is willing to kneel. Power clashes with power, body against body, will against will, until the bond between them becomes impossible to deny-and impossible to escape.
This is not a romance born of choice.
It is a bond forged in violence, sustained by politics, and watched by a world eager to turn desire into treason.
As armies gather and doctrine sharpens its knives, both kings must confront the same truth: survival has always demanded sacrifice. The question is no longer whether something will be taken from them-but what.
Dark, intense, and uncompromising, The Horned King is a slow-burn MM romantasy of enemies forced together by curse and crown. It is a story of power that bruises, intimacy that wounds, and love that threatens to destroy the very structures it touches.
Freedom is not promised.
Love is not safe.
And some chains grow strongest the moment they are refused.