A Maiden

Forced to face many challenges along the way—from the harsh world they travel through to the fiery passion they both try to deny—each is determined to break the curse so the other can get their happily-ever-after. And it just might work, if Jill can manage to overlook the fire-breathing, bat-winged remnants of Baelin’s dragon half long enough to see the man beneath the beast and get the job done.

Jill Donahue is frantically looking for a last minute birthday gift for her niece but instead of finding a toy and heading to her family’s home, she gets sent back to the 13th century. She’s immediately detained by villagers who saw her appear of the blue and they decide that the girl who was to be a sacrifice for a dragon should step down and Jill should take her place. Jill’s not thrilled to say the least but what can she do when they tie her to a post in the middle of nowhere.

Baelin of Gosforth has been stuck living as a dragon for the past 216 years. He lives as a man only 1 month out of every year due to a curse by a scorned witch. He needs the help of the maiden that is sacrificed to him every year but up until now the maidens have cowered in corners until he sets them free after the month is up. He did have a couple maidens who tried to help, but failed. When he meets Jill, who’s been thrown back in time, he knows that she’s different from the maidens that had come before him. She doesn’t cower before him and she likes to backtalk him as well. He convinces Jill to help him try to break the curse and since Jill is positive that breaking the curse is the only way to send her back to her time, she agrees.

Baelin and Jill head off to try to go about breaking the curse. Baelin knows that Jill will have to face three challenges in order to break the curse but he doesn’t know what those challenges are. He only knows that they have something to do with knightly virtues such as honor, bravery, courage, etc. On their travels they meet with another knight who is actually a dragonslayer so they hide Baelin’s wings (he has them even though he’s a man) as well as some unsavory folk. The challenges end up being much harder than either thought but they end up bringing Baelin and Jill together in a way that they can’t live without each other. Unfortunately Jill will get sent back to the 21st century and then where will that leave Baelin?

I scooped this story up immediately when I read the blurb. It contains so many of my favorite things: it’s set in medieval times, has a dragon-shifter (kind of), has time travel and of course a love story. It ended up being just as good as I hoped it would be so that was a big bonus.

Let me start with Baelin. He was a knight at one point who had fought dragons but had also lost everyone and everything that he had been close to at one time all because of a woman scorned. The woman was called the Dark Witch and she had cursed Baelin because he refused to serve her…or service her. Her anger got the best of her and Baelin suffered in the end. He was a good person who just wanted to live a normal life and my heart went out to him and his life-altering predicament.

Compared to Baelin’s quiet steadfastness Jill seemed a bit brash at times. She was the epitome of the 21st century girl and wasn’t afraid to say just what came to mine, whether it was smart to do so or not. Her mouth got her into trouble time and again. She was a trooper though considering everything that she went through over the course of the 30 days, I’ll give you that.

Baelin and Jill together were combustive. They could argue with the best of them but in the end loved each other so very much. I desperately wanted them to be together but couldn’t quite figure out how the author would make that happen in the end. I was pleasantly surprised in how it all worked out, that’s for sure.

Dillon is a new to me author but I liked her story telling style and I look forward to reading more in this series.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Lori Dillon