Even though I didn't always have the headspace for a complex, political high fantasy book full of intrigues and magical beasts and deception, I really enjoyed myself and think this is a great start to a unique and interesting series! It's difficult to review this book without giving too much away, but I really enjoyed the complex world-building and the magic system, though some of that isn't fully revealed yet as we discover ot together with our protagonist. I loved that the different nations were diverse in culture and traditions and looks and the tensions that created. There is a lot of mystery yet to be discovered, about the magic and the mysterious sixth nation and some backgrounds of characters, which entices me for book two! The characters were also complex and I'm impressed by how the protagonist is handled so well through all her disguises and cons, how she grows throughout the story and still stays true to herself. At some points I found it a bit confusing and though we see a lot of her thought process for her plotting and planning for most parts of the story, we don't at all know what's going on in the end until everything is revealed.. but of course that makes sense to create tension. Yet the book wasn't a complete highlight for me because for most of it I really struggled with actually seeing in my head what was going on - apparently the author isn't the best at describing or maybe my memory was serving me poorly, but usually I see very distinct and detailed pictures in my head when reading and that wasn't the case here. Which is a shame because the world-building is so rich and there are so many cool beasts - I have just no idea what they look like 😅 But apart from that a great story which I'll definitely look further into when the following books are published! Thanks to Netgalley and Kensington Publishing for the e-arc!!