Caro Oresteia has grown up delivering cargo up and down the river with her father. After her father is arrested without cause, Caro is blackmailed into transporting a mysterious crate to earn his release. When it becomes clear the large box is being sought by pirates, she opens it, wanting to know what’s inside. It’s a young man, a royal courtier from a neighboring country in political upheaval. He’s arrogant and annoying and utterly useless on a boat until their pursuers force his hand. He’s still not great on water, but it turns out he is good with a sword. It also turns out he’s lying about his identity. If the romance is inevitable, the characters and world-building and action-packed plot make this a satisfying, adventurous read. Markos, it turns out, has a mission that strays from what his handlers expect, and Caro risks her father’s freedom helping him. Meanwhile, the traditional expectations he’s been raised with for women contrast sharply with Caro’s experience. Wherry captains are just as apt to be women as men, while her mother runs a great ocean shipping company, and her parents’ devotion is genuine but they lead separate and fulfilling independent lives. Myth and magic are woven throughout this fast-paced story. Strong-willed Caro is biracial (Black/white), and Markos is her worthy partner in whatever adventure comes next. (Age 12 and older)

Caroline Oresteia is destined for the river. Her father is a wherryman, as was her grandmother. All Caro needs is for the river god to whisper her name, and her fate is sealed. But at seventeen, Caro may be too late.

So when pirates burn ships and her father is arrested, Caro volunteers to transport mysterious cargo in exchange for his release. Secretly, Caro hopes that by piloting her own wherry, the river god will finally speak her name.

But when the cargo becomes more than Caro expected, she finds herself caught in a web of politics and lies. With much more than her father's life at stake, Caro must choose between the future she knows, and the one she could have never imagined.