To Bind the Court

Empire of Ash and Song

By: D. E. Carlson

Narrated by: Starlit Audiobooks

When you play the games of emperors, you’ll pay an emperor’s ransom.

Iris is destined to destroy the Fire Empire’s hold on the world. In the Fire City—the very beating heart of the Fire Empire—lies one final hope, but to seek it is to draw near to the one who hunts her, and her greatest hope becomes her worst nightmare. If she plays her enemy’s game, she may lose.

Prince Besaun has lost everything. Betrayed by the girl he loves, he languishes in a prison of his own making while his mother holds her tortured and captive to ensure he cooperates in her schemes. The bars of his prison grow ever tighter-until the arrival of someone unexpected into his life.

Can he doom an empire to save one girl?

To Bind the Court is book two of the Empire of Ash and Song series. Perfect for fans of the faith themes of the Chronicles of Narnia, the powerful writing style of A Court of Thorns and Roses, and the clean, sweet romance of Caraval!

©2024 D. C. Mountain Publishing (P)2025 Dorothy Carlson

Poor audio editing

I love the story and writing. It's so good. I want to stress that; the author did an amazing job. But for the performance...it sounds like it was recorded in an empty room. You can hear the sounds bouncing around the room ever so slightly; simple editing could have fixed that. I don't recommend wearing headphones/earbuds because any sort of exclamation just red lines horribly and it hurts. And the accents...they are super inconsistent and unbelievable. Also, please stop pinching your nose to voice certain characters...I get the intent, but again without proper sound engineering, it's just irritating. So much effort went into trying to make this fun and immersive, which is commendable, but that effort should have been put into making the end product sound decent instead.