Sanctuary (Roman’s Chronicles, #1) by Ilona Andrews 
Series: Roman's Chronicles #1
Published by NYLA on July 30, 2024
Genres: Paranormal/Urban Fantasy
Pages: 152
Format: eBook
Source: Author
I received this book for free from Author in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
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It’s not easy serving the Chernobog, the God of Destruction, Darkness and Death…especially during the holidays; and especially when you’re out of eggnog and one of your pesky, freeloading mythic creatures has eaten your last cookie.
Roman would like nothing more than to be left alone, but when a wounded boy stumbles into his yard and begs for sanctuary, Roman takes him in. Now elite mercenaries are camped out on his property, combat mages are dousing the house with fire, and strange priests are unleashing arcane magic. They thought Roman was easy pickings, just a hermit in the woods, but they chose the wrong dark priest to annoy. For while Roman might be patient, he is the Black Volhv, filled with the love of his terrible god. For his adversaries, it's a fight to the death, but for him, it's just another day in the neighborhood.
Everyone loves Roman!
Actually maybe there isn’t much difference between this story and the 90’s sitcom. Roman, like Raymond, has crazy parents always trying to drop by, the jealous brother but Roman has magical critters instead of kids and venison stew instead of lemon chicken
Roman is everyone’s favorite dark volhv from the Kate Daniels series. He serves the Pagen God Chernobog, God of Destruction, Darkness and Death, because someone’s gotta do it.
Roman finds a teenaged boy collapsed on his property and the only thing the kid says is Santuary. Roman takes him in and while the kid won’t tell who he is hiding from, Roman doesn’t have to wait long for mercenaries to show up trying to take the kid away. They made a mistake trying to attack a volhv of Chernobog on his consecrated lands and we have an exciting standoff between mercs and magic.
Roman unfortunately has more problems than just mercenaries at the door. Roman only insists on having three days off each year–from December 23 to 25th–and not so he can partake in holiday festivities but so he can hide away from them. But this year it seems Chernobog and the Mrs have had a fight and Roman keeps finding himself being dragged down to Nav — the Pagen hellscape — so he can drag a fir tree across the frozen landscape. Chernobog is trying to make it up to his wife with a little gift so the Mrs (a/ka/ the Goddess Morena) can decorate a tree for the holidays — it seems every religion enjoys a pretty holiday tree. Roman is not a fan of being dragged into marital spats whether between his parents or his God, but especially not on his promised days off.
THOUGHTS:
I am not kidding about how much fans of the Kate Daniels series love our Dark Volhv Roman. One of my favorite scenes is when Kate and Curran ask Roman to officiate their wedding and how excited he got since no one ever asks him to officiate anything nice. “When some supernatural filth tries to carry off the children, call Roman so he can wade through blood and sewage to rescue them, but when it’s something nice like a wedding or a naming, oh no, we can’t have Chernobog’s volhv involved. It’s bad luck. Get Nikolai. When he finds out who I’m going to marry, he’ll have an aneurysm. His head will explode. It’s good that he’s a doctor, maybe he can treat himself.” Magic Shifts.
This story was originally released as a free weekly serial (without the ending) and anyone who was reading along each Friday will be sad and happy to find out that we don’t get all the answers to all the questions in the epilogue or the extra bonus scene. It should be noted that this books is listed as Book 1 of Roman’s Chronicles. YES!!! That means while we might not have all our answers, Book 1 says there will be more Roman stories. The downside is that Ilona and Gordon have talked about their current full workload so it may be quite awhile before we get back to Roman and Finn. 🙁
Favorite Scene:
I love that even the dark priest of Chernobog has to deal with his own mother, and even the powers bestowed on a dark priest can’t save him…
The dog door flap thudded, and a huge raven flew into the office and landed on Ramon’s desk.
Damn it all.
“There you are,” the raven said in his mother’s voice.
The nuthatch cringed. “Hello, Mrs. Tihomirov.”
“Petya. And what are you doing here?”
“Leaving, actually.” Debrowski hopped off the table and flew off into the house.
Coward.
Roman sighed. “Yes?”
“Yes? That’s all you have to say to me?”
Chernobog, grant me patience…
“I know this is a hard time of the year for you. The whole family is at the house celebrating and you are stuck out here alone like some frozen mushroom. I made your favorite pirogi. I kept waiting and waiting to see if you would reach out. I didn’t want to smother you.”
The Void is darkness, the Void is peace, I am within it, wrapped in its cold embrace, and I am at peace.
“You do not call. You do not answer. Is your phone broken? No? You probably unplugged it again. You do not send a word with one of your critters. For three days I have waited.”
Nothing reaches the Void for it is the beginning and end of all things…
“Finally, I come to check on you and find you surrounded by some zarazas who try to shoot my bird, you look like death warmed over, and all you can say to me is, ‘yes’?”
Within the Void I am serene.
“What an ungrateful son I have. Why haven’t you killed them yet? What have you been doing?”
Chernobog, grant me patience.
“As you can see, I have company.” Roman glanced at Finn. “This is Finn, Morena’s new priest. Finn, this is my mother, Evdokia, the Head Witch of the Witch Oracle.”
The raven pivoted to Finn, who stared back like a deer in headlights.
“Finn is my guest. The dickheads outside are soldiers for hire, and they’ve been hired by their client to apprehend Finn. If I kill them, that wouldn’t solve the problem, would it? It would just postpone it because we don’t know who the client is, and they will try again.”
The raven peered at Finn.
A few seconds passed.
A few more.
“Ha!” The raven cackled. “Karma!”
“What?”
“That’s the consequences of your own actions sitting in that chair. And this one was a long time coming.”
Roman stared at Finn. No, there was no way. “He isn’t mine.”
“Would that he was! If he were your child, that would be a miracle. One I would joyously welcome. If you managed to sire a son, I would strip naked and run around the woods like one of those Beltane nudists.”
Roman squeezed his eyes shut before his brain had a chance to grapple with that mental image. “Mother!”
“What is wrong with you? You are thirty-four years old. I can see gray hair on your head. How is it you haven’t made any babies yet?”
Void…
“Have you had yourself checked?”
“For what?” he snarled.
“For low sperm count.”
Roman groaned.
“How is your testosterone? Or is that you are having trouble sealing the deal? If you’re having equipment malfunctions, I have herbs for that–“
“Mother!” he roared.
“And now you are yelling at me. Because why not, go ahead, yell at your mother, who was in labor with you for two days.”
“Every year the labor gets longer. Maybe your memory isn’t what it used to be.”
The raven fell ominously silent. Oh shit.
