Romantasy

The word went from joke to shelf label in a handful of years. The reason is simple: fantasy permits what the present forbids. A contract that binds you for seven years, a king whose oath bars him from love, a forester whose eyes catch the light wrong.

The world's rules are part of the love story, not backdrop. There's a power imbalance between mortal and immortal. And the danger is physical, not merely social.

Beneath a frozen lake in “The Pact Beneath the Ice” courtiers bet on your failure while King Cael may not love. In “Flames Beneath the Skin” you're a dragon in human form whose secret a healer is about to touch. And in Vienna's “Night Archive” your new boss is a vampire who makes tea instead of answering questions.