As the Mongol Horde draws near her tiny Russian principality, a spinster princess Yaroslava fears the worst. Her father is too old and ill to organize the defense. Yet her people would not follow her because she is a woman. The princes from the neighboring city-states and principalities won’t come to help because of the old feuds. Worse yet, Yaroslava receives a foretelling that she will betray her people.

Yelnik, the principality’s throne town, falls. Most of its defenders perish. Attractive women and craftsmen are taken into slavery. Yaroslava herself becomes a slave, destined to serve the Mongol khan as his concubine. In captivity she faces many enemies. Among them are: a Russian slave with a grudge; a fellow concubine that can kill with the power of the evil eye; her uncle whom Yaroslava mistakenly thinks she can trust. To survive and regain freedom for herself and the other slaves from Yelnik, she will break a religious taboo against using magic, commit treason and defeat vodyanoy, an elemental being that wishes to imprison her soul in its river for eternity.

“A Handful of Earth” is available from Amazon