Kingdom of Maids (Incidents on Iphigenia #3)

Phala Indraphos is another half-employed artist living in a decaying beach bungalow with her slacking boyfriend, enjoying the waves, creating murals, and doing magazine illustrations to make ends meet. Money is tight, but she lives gig to gig without much thought for tomorrow. She’s a local girl in Aulis, the dazzling capital jewel of Iphigenia – a planet where two moons paint the night sky, unbridgeable social divisions run deep—and where clone labor and indentured service are vital to both humanity’s survival and the preservation of vast fortunes.

This has nothing to do with Phala’s life—or so she thinks. Suddenly, her world turns upside down, starting when she lands her first good commission in an oil portrait for the aristocratic and captivating Alcmene Ulanka, an heiress of enormous wealth. As Phala's brush strokes bring Alcmene's likeness to life, something unexpected happens—an unforeseen attraction blossoms, defying the rules of their strict society.

Just as Phala begins to understand her heart, enemies both visible and hidden threaten, and her world comes apart. Betrayed and drowning in debt, she faces a nightmarish indentured servitude. In a twist befitting the planet's wild and unforgiving landscape, it's Alcmene who purchases her contract, whisking Phala away to an opulent villa on a sprawling estate.

Now marked with the symbols of service and bound as a lady's maid to the woman who admires her art, Phala navigates a minefield of desire, duty, and class barriers. Their connection deepens under the twin moons and the scorching sun as they learn they may have more in common than they think …

But society’s watchful eyes never blink. Enter the calculating Nestor, Alcmene's suitor, whose charm barely masks a heart as barren as the surrounding alkali wastelands. As Nestor circles, the threat of a mysterious and brutal plantation press-gang looms, turning a tale of unspoken, forbidden love into a fight for freedom and survival.

When violence erupts, and Phala finds herself exiled to the estate's vineyards, both women must confront the true nature of their feelings – and the very real chains that may bind them. But in a world where status is everything, can love be enough to save Alcmene’s freedom and Phala’s life? Or will the final battle end in defeat for the Kingdom of Maids?