Daughter of the Blood

Anne Bishop
1998

This book begins strongly, with a mysterious and dramatic scene that is actually set several hundred years before the rest of the story. The characters are long-lived though, and Tersa, Daemon Sadi the Sadist, and his half brother Lucivar are all still alive to see the events predicted in the beginning.

Anne Bishop has created a world with its own hierarchy of power, based around magic and strength, and the interplay of gender. Those born to the blood have power, and the darker the jewels they can claim, the stronger the power. Men of the blood are compelled to serve a Queen, and Queens are to care for them, but some of the blood is corrupt and the Priestess Dorothea is creating an empire of enslaved men and weak Queens to serve her.

When Dreams are made flesh in the form of Witch, Sadi finds the one he has waited to serve in a most unexpected form. Jaenelle is only a child. Full of power but confused, lonely and in terrible danger. She has friends amongst many races, among the living and the dead, but her own family puts her in deadly danger.

I was struck by the way that the author handled the relationship between Sadi and Jaenelle. As a black-jewelled Warlord Prince, he is immensely powerful. As Dorothea’s pleasure slave, he has a reputation for sadistic sensuality. As a male of the blood, he adores and desires the Queen he serves, which is Jaenelle. He is shown to be fiercely protective of her physically and emotionally, and very careful of her youth and vulnerability.

Saetan, Lord of Hell and the father of Sadi and Lucivar, becomes her worried mentor in the art of magic. He too is shown to be protective of Jaenelle, hampered by her reluctance to discuss where she lives when she isn’t visiting him for lessons. He is sure she is suffering, but feels unable to compel her to safety in his home.

The abuse of young female witches, and blood males, is demonstrated in no uncertain terms, and I found myself as frustrated as Saetan and Sadi by the events that unfold.

The only thing I could say about this book that isn’t positive is that there was very little explanation of the relationship between power, blood, jewels, hierarchy and what commonly referred to magic meant. It made things somewhat confusing, and while I don’t expect an infodump at the beginning of the story, I think a little more detail on this would have helped me understand what was going on between the characters.

However, it wasn’t an overwhelming problem and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series.