The Chalice and the Blade

By Glenna McReynolds

Set in twelfth century Wales, this is the story of Ceri, daughter of privilege until one terrible day when her family's castle, located on a cliff beside the sea, was overrun and overthrown and her family killed. The only survivors were the child Ceri, her young brother and a woman who managed to escape the destruction with the two children.
When Ceri grew up, she was horrified to discover she was the intended bride of the man who had invaded her castle home and killed her family, the Boar of Balor, Caradoc. Caradoc wants the girl because he believes that union with her will give him access to the magical powers inherent in the old castle. Underneath the castle are miles of passages and natural caves and dwelling in those caves are huge magical creatures, the pryf, dragon spawn.
Anyway, Ceri runs away only to end up in the hands of a sadistic knight who intends to rape her. But she is saved by a mysterious magician, Dain Lavrans. Ceri was handled very harshly by the knight and Dain has the knowledge necessary to heal her. So he keeps her in his impregnable tower to tend to her injuries and to help her get well again. Of course, they fall in love and together must stand and fight off all those who wish to see them parted, with the help of the local fairy people. (Who seem not very fairy and a lot plain old human.)

This was a fantastically boring book. In fact, I started reading it and stopped at about page 200 and didn't pick it up again for months. The vast majority of the book is about Ceri and Dain falling in love. So mainly it is a romance novel with a fantasy setting and I am not a fan of romance stories. The only interesting part of the story is the pyrf but you don't get to see them at all until the last part of the story and they don't play much of a role anyway, just happening to blindly crush a few soldiers who get in their way.
Bottom line, this book never captured my attention.