Bride of the Bear King: A Twisted East of the Sun and West of the Moon Retelling

She traded her life for a white bear king, then broke his one rule, and the curse forced her to hunt him beyond the last map.

To save her family, she agrees to live with a white bear king, and the bargain demands silence, obedience, and desire.

On her eighteenth nameday, a young woman from a starving household accepts a stranger’s offer in the snow. Food for her family. Safety for her siblings. One price. She rides north with a white bear whose eyes carry a human mind and a hunger shaped by old story magic.

His fortress stands in a dead stretch of winter where the sky stays the color of ash. The bear king offers protection and a bed behind locked doors. One rule holds the house together. No light at night. No questions. No attempt to learn the face behind the beast.

Desire grows alongside fear, and the line between captive and chosen bride starts to blur. Servants move like ghosts through ice halls. The wind carries songs with missing endings. Each night, hands in the dark hold her with careful restraint, then with need.

One night, she breaks the rule.

Light spills. Truth spills with it. The curse snaps tight, and the bear king vanishes into the storm, claimed by a power older than vows. To bring him back, she must cross cursed lands where the wind speaks in riddles, the roads shift, and every bargain costs blood.

The deeper she goes, the clearer the monster question becomes. The beast in her bed never held the sharpest teeth. The story itself does.

Bride of the White Bear King is Book Three in Wicked Ever After, an adult dark romantasy retelling of East of the Sun and West of the Moon with gothic atmosphere, high heat, and a deadly curse.