Lilla is a young princess and a rebel-in-disguise. As if navigating the traps of royal court and a rebel camp werenât hard enough, her world is turned upside-down with the arrival of a mysterious and ruggedly handsome general. He confuses her heart and brings with him news of a new Era War between dueling archgods that threatens to burn through Lillaâs home world and the whole Seven Galaxies. With time running out, Lilla must learn to control her magic and defeat the dark archgod before He finds her. The last Lumenian.
Lilla is a young princess and a rebel-in-disguise. As if navigating the traps of royal court and a rebel camp werenât hard enough, her world is turned upside-down with the arrival of a mysterious and ruggedly handsome general. He confuses her heart and brings with him news of a new Era War between dueling archgods that threatens to burn through Lillaâs home world and the whole Seven Galaxies. With time running out, Lilla must learn to control her magic and defeat the dark archgod before He finds her. The last Lumenian.
âI canât breathe,â I say through clenched teeth. Panic cascades down my spine like waves of a crushing tide. Panic so familiar yet so alien. My constant companion for the past fourteen years, since I was five.
My skin burns hot-and-cold-and-hot-again. Black spots bleed into my vision until it narrows into a pinpoint. I can no longer see the control compartment of our beat-up space vessel.
My seat swallows me up. I buck against its constraints, tearing against the tight harness. âI have to get out of here!â
I canât slow my breathing. The icy air burns against my throat with each inhalation. I am drowning without being in water.
âLilla, listen to my voice,â Arrov, the pilot of our ship, says. âI am here. Youâre not alone.â
He brushes my hands to the side. Off the stubborn harness buckles. With a click the restraints cutting into me disappear.
I spring to my feet. The urge to flee! to run! pumps my blood, drowning out the hum of the ship.
A gentle hand touches mine.
âStill blind to my surroundings, I grasp it before it can retreat. My lifeline out of the madness.
âYouâre fine. Youâll be all right now.â
Arrovâs voice conjures his imageâhis almost seven-foot height, his athletic build, his angular face with pale-blue skin framed by short dark-blue hair, his straight nose and always smiling lips. Iâve heard him called âstunningly handsomeâ behind his back, followed by heaving sighs. I must admit theyâre right. Of course I would never say that out loud in his presence!
His thumb rubs a circle in my palm, a mesmerizing motion. I focus on his touch. For the first time since setting foot on this godsforsaken ship, I can take a deep breath.
Inhale through the nose, exhale through the mouth.
Again.â
âMinutes, or hours, drag by before the hot-and-cold-and-hot-again vanishes. I look up, right into blue eyes that are so dark theyâre almost black.
âBetter?â
I nod.
Arrov flashes white, even teeth. His smile makes him appear younger than I am, though he is in his mid-twenties.
I look at our hands, embarrassed that he had to witness one of my âepisodes,â and I pull my hand away. Arrov is the only person in the rebellion who doesnât judge me. Or hold who I am against me. Will that change from now on? I shudder.
âHere, this should help.â Arrov takes off his jacket and drapes it over my shoulders.
âI was getting hot anyway,â he says, cutting off any argument. âI donât think the temp controls work on this junk.â
âThank you.â I burrow into his warm jacket.
A dark blue blush appears on Arrovâs cheeks. He is the perfect image of his home planet, Aâice. One of the richer worlds in the nineteen-planet-strong Pax Septum Coalition, where winter rules three quarters of the year.â
âMy gaze flickers to the control panel, outdated with its manual levers. âWe should check for incoming messages . . .â my voice trails off when I notice a fast blinking light, signaling incoming messages. How long has it been blinking like that?
Arrov sees it too, and a flash of concern crosses his expression.
My stomach drops. We had three tasks: wait for the message from the rebellionâs patron; respond with the code to receive coordinates; and meet with their caravan to load supplies. Simple.
Arrov runs his fingers over the controls to retrieve the message. âWe missed our chance. They sent the message more than ten minutes ago.â
Ten minutes! By making the caravan wait, we indicated âmission compromised.â
âBut Iâll send our code anyway.â Arrov taps a few controls. âMaybe they waited for us.â
And maybe Iâd turn into a believer of the Archgoddess of the Eternal Light and Order and start praying for Her help. As if.
We stare at the light, waiting for it to blink again. Without getting the
âcoordinates we have no hope of completing our mission.
âAnything?â I sit back before I start pacing. I buckle my harness, but this time I donât make it as tight. Better not to trigger the panic that hovers at the edge of my consciousness, waiting to pounce. Never fully gone.
Arrov glances at me. âNothing.â
âXor will be furious!â I blew the mission. My first mission. One that I volunteered for, and only got because Arrov offered to pilot the craft. It seems bad luck is contagious.
âDonât beat yourself up, Lilla. There will be other chances.â
I am not so sure about that. I proved Xorâs right-hand man, Belthair, right. I failed the mission as he predicted.
Something appears on our viewscreen.
Arrov, oblivious, says, âListen, I know how you must feelââ
âButââ I point toward the view screen.
Arrov grabs my flailing hand in both of his. âI know there is a lot of pressure on you right now.â
âYou donât understandââ
âYouâre right.â He pats my hand. âI canât understand, but I can imagine how you must worry. But you cannot overreactââ
âStop,â I shout.
âNo need to be so harsh, I was just trying toââ
âAsteroids!â
There are so many YA Fantasy stories out there to choose from, but if you're looking for a read that is immersive, has such exceptional world-building and intricately detailed characters there's a glossary to keep track of everything, then you absolutely must dive into Last Lumenian.Â
To say I enjoyed this read would be a sad misrepresentation. The unique, colorful landscape into which the author deftly weaves her tale was exquisitely described. So much so, I felt surrounded by each scene as I read it. Who needs VR! While there were many characters to meet and histories to learn, the flow of the story never felt bogged down. The pacing was precisely what it needed to be in order to draw you in AND keep you turning pages.Â
Lilla is a teenager and she's just what she should be: adventurous, rebellious, curious, uncertain. Particularly when abilities she didn't realize she had begin to complicate her life. Magic has no place in her steady role as the ruling King's daughter. She has responsibilities and requirements to fulfill, but those roles lead her into murky waters where she discovers oppression on a galactic scale.Â
And, like any great coming of age tale, just when she thinks she's beginning to understand things, along comes a powerful general whose focus on his mission could lead to the destruction of her entire world! Emotions and wills collide. The status quo turns upside down, and whether she's ready or not, Lilla is thrust into a quest that will either devour her entirely or change her absolutely.