Lord of ice by Gaelen Foley

Damien, twin of Lucien, is a Peninsular war hero who is now the owner of a dilapidated estate. He is tormented by flashback dreams of battle scenes that make him somewhat violent and unaware of his surroundings. Terrified that he might injure a woman during one of these episodes, Damien has held himself apart from love. No sooner has Damien sequestered himself away in the country than he receives notice that a close friend has died and left him the guardianship of a young girl. Damien decides to pay a visit to his new ward before deciding what to do with her.

Miranda FitzHubert is an illegitimate orphan, residing in a bleak girls’ school run by a minister who likes fondling - and flogging - young girls. She sneaks out at night to join a local acting troupe on the stage, where she enthralls the audience with her singing. While stealing back to the school, she is approached by a handsome man who apparently thinks she’s a lightskirt. Miranda evades him but is set upon by thugs, whereupon the stranger comes to her rescue. Miranda runs, but looks back in time to see her rescuer kill several men with his bare hands.

Miranda, of course, is Damien’s new ward, much older than he anticipated. Damien decides to take Miranda to London and install her with his family, but she attempts to escape him and return to the school to save one of the younger girls. The truth comes out, and Damien dispatches the minister and headmistress with quick efficiency, earning himself Miranda’s undying devotion. She falls headlong in love with him and decides she’ll help him overcome his dark side. Damien, of course, is having none of it, no matter how attracted he is to the woman he first mistook for a whore.

The premise of this novel has been “borrowed” from Cathy Sova’s blog. For I felt no one could capture the story better than she has. So here I will just attach a small note of my own.

Note –
If you thought Lucien knight (the hero of the previous book in the series) had the most severe darkness inside him, created by the spying, the treachery that he was forced to do for his country, it will come as a surprise to you that how much darker is the soul of a man who fought directly on the battlefield….the soul of Damien. The way the post war trauma eating up Damien’s soul has been sketched is heart breaking. He’s sure his going insane…sure that he will end up like a mad animal, wild, dangerous to others and not in control of himself. The portrayal of struggle of Damien is the second best part of this book…How he needs Miranda’s love and yet how he fights against his own feelings…fearing he will injure Miranda in one of his fits of mad rage. The character of Miranda though comes across a bit weak and terrified in the beginning and her metamorphosis into the woman who makes Damien open up his soul and pour out the terrifying war experiences is a bit too unbelievable. Ms. Foley could have sketched this character better. The secondary character of Miranda’s cousin Crispin is also interestingly done.

Now to my favorite part of the book…It comes after where most stories end…a happily ever after, after the happily ever after. After Miranda and Damien are married and settle down in their country house reveling in the joy life has offered to them, basking in the glory of the future that they are building for themselves…when Napoleon escapes Elba, and a war breaks out again. A war to which Damien should go. A war to which Miranda doesn’t want to send him, fearing he will lose Damien to the war again. A choice that both of them should make, whether to stay content watching a war that needs him or overcoming the fear of it all and going back to the Battle of Waterloo. This last part and Damien’s superb character makes this book an interesting read. I still feel character of Miranda could have been done better. The highlight of the book for me is how Damien not only conquers his fears but also soundly defeats it forever creating that happily ever after, after the happily ever after.
7/10…Just for you Damien