That wasn't a kiss...
That was a fucking confession.
That was a fucking confession.
Kissed by the Gods
Caty Rogan
Eternal Wars, book one
Kindle edition, 610 pages
Published September 24, 2025
ASIN B0DY51PX3J
Leina has spent a lifetime submitting. Kneeling. Enduring.
Then soldiers come for her brother, and divine fury surges through her veins. She expects execution for the bodies she left in her wake. Her people have met bloody ends for far, far less.
Instead, Ryot, a godsworn warrior born to privilege and raised in order, drags her into a world that was never meant for her. One of divine armies and death demons, winged war horses and monsters, sacred power and royal secrets.
A kiss from a goddess changes everything.
No longer a criminal, Leina is a prize. The kingdom’s most powerful men want what the goddess touched. Leina wants only one thing, though: freedom for her people. And she’ll trade herself for the strength to destroy the kingdom that broke them.
Conscripted into a war she never asked for, fighting for gods she doesn’t believe in, Leina must decide how far she’s willing to go and what she’s willing to lose. Because her power is more than a threat to the kingdom’s buried secrets.
It’s a death sentence.
Twenty-four year old Leina Haverlyn lives with her parents and two younger brothers, Seb and Leo. They're all that's left after Faraengardian soldiers took Alden and her twin brother, Levvi, six years ago. The day they killed Levvi's wife, Irielle. The day Leina relives in her nighmares.
They farm wheat to sell in the markets, barely surviving. Simply enduring in a world where no one outside their kin can be trusted.
Mother is a healer while Leina is endowed with heightened senses that overwhelm her at times, to the point of debilitation.
The Collection has begun again and it's here that the story begins.
The soldiers are coming for Seb and her father commands Leina to take her distraught mother inside. It's an inevitable loss and not something the people can fight.
But fight Leina does.
Compelled to hold her ground, to stand against the king's soldiers who would take her brother and force him into slavery in the mines, Leina raises her scythe in defiance.
And the bodies start dropping.
Her mother. Her father.
And still she vibrates with a calm energy that forces her to act. Her blade slices the captain's throat and clangs against a swordsman's chest. She catches arrows and flings them back.
It's power she's never known herself capable of. She speaks with a voice she's never heard. One that commands. One that threatens pain and death.
A voice that goes unanswered as the last of the soldiers begins to be eaten alive by bugs that spawn from his mouth and eyes.
The premise was strong, with a thrilling start.
Bonded weapons. Winged horses. Mental and emotional projection, both past and present. Ryot.
Thirty-one year old Ryot, Skywarden of Stormriven, is an Altor sent to execute the rebel but upon discovering Leina his orders are immediately null and void. For an Altor is above the laws of man and an Altor is what Leina is. The first female Altor.
And it's now his duty to collect her and deliver their newest warrior to the Synod, and to the Archon leaders, where she's met with contempt and suspicion in varying degrees from among her new peers and overlords.
Leina survives her first challenge, one to the death, and finds a place in a cast. With Ryot. With Thalric and his ward, Leif. With Caius and his ward, Kiernan. With Faelon. And with the medic, Nyrica. They become her only allies. Allies that warn her not to catch feelings. There are rules. And for the Altor, bonds and vows and loyalty exists only in their duty to the gods. They forsake family, past and future.
Leina convinces Ryot to take her as his ward. It's something he isn't keen on, as his last four wards have all prematurely died. But relent he does. "Will you be mine?" he asks.
"I already am."
I tilt my head back, so I can look directly in his eyes. "Yes. Master Ryot."
I mean to say it sarcastically, but it comes out something else altogether. There's a flash in his eyes—it's primal and it burns, and it starts a fire that stirs something in my own soul.
He liked that.
And gods help me, so did I.
I mean to say it sarcastically, but it comes out something else altogether. There's a flash in his eyes—it's primal and it burns, and it starts a fire that stirs something in my own soul.
He liked that.
And gods help me, so did I.
One horse. One tent. Mentor/ward. Forced proximity. Possessive MMC. Dream sharing. Forbidden love. Magic/powers.
Leina is a strong FMC. She is also very bitter, has a martyr mentality, and demands that others see the world through her eyes while making zero effort to see it through theirs. I found her furiously annoying at times.
And we're snowballing from there.
I was repulsed by the Crimson Feather. But that's me and my wiring. I'm sure others would be delighted by the place.
It's a fantasy world and men still can't have a contraception method? Ffs. Then Leina gets offended when a man goes to touch her, which yeah, a big no, but she'd already been flicking at his chest jewelry twice. You touched him first, Leina. Don't be a hypocrite.
I am simply not a fan of FMCs whom everybody loves regardless of what they do or don't do. I need characters to call one another out on the bullshit. I need them to grow together. Heal together. Overcome together. Just stop worshipping the bitter bitch.
"Don't call her a girl." Tf, Ryot? You've called her Rebel Girl more times than I've cared to count. It was a sweet endearment that you've now just tainted.
How I struggled through the last twenty percent of the book. But in it, the truth of the Collection is revealed and an alternative path for the Altors becomes a possibility.
Does the author have a crush on Hemsworth's Thor? I'd wager on yes. However, her description of Ryot remains the least bothersome of my complaints.
3 out of 5 stars. DNF at ninety-two percent. This is book one of a six book series. It is unlikely I will continue it.
Available in ebook | hardcover | paperback
Previously in the series:
2025/46
