First word of caution: 
 This is not really a YA novel... 
 Finally now I can wait for the final book... sigh. It was tiring..... it's like playing non-stop Skyrim through all those quest stuff. 
 Why Skyrim? hell, I could totally get the whole idea of Nordic rivalry... its like stormcloak vs empire vs tholmar..... haha... there's a dragon 'sesat' in the middle of the story anyway. 
 Okay. The book is long... honestly, the rest bellow is actually small midget part of the story... Its too confusing infact you can totally skip the rest of the summary if you want to... 
 *Ian Somerhalder voice over* Previously on The Exiled Queen: *insert Skyrim ost the part when Dragon usually pop up in the sky* 
 Princess-in-hiding Raisa, who goes under the name of Rebecca, was spending one year in the military school and have a brief tryst with former-streetlord/murderer-suddenly turn wizard, Han Alister, as his etiquette tutor (because Han thought Rebecca work as a tutor with the Bayars... yada2 long story...) 
 So, Micah Bayar found out Raisa was hiding under his nose all along and kidnapped her during an assassination attempt that was arranged by Lord Bayar, Micah's dad, who wanted her dead so that he can raise a 13 yo kid to be a queen and dominate the entire queendom. Ok, why Micah save her? He still smitten with Raisa and want to go against his family. 
 So, love-struck Han was confused with why his sworn enemy Malfoy Micah would want to kidnap his girlfriend 'kekasih gelap' (for lack of word on how complex their relationship is) and thought that the whole deal she got kidnapped was just a revenge attempt on him and so Raisa's bodyguard Amon split up with Han to trace where Micah kidnap her. Then while being kidnapped by the gang of wizard, the Bayars fell into a trap and was captured by one rival prince and his army in an enemy soil, Raisa use this as a diversion and escaped. Instead of going back to the school down south, she decided that its time to go back home for her mother. Fuh... 
 Okay, the book started with Raisa disguising herself as a travelling trader in a tavern and was nearly hired by two ladies who need company to pass through the border. Coincidently, the Queen of Guard aka Captain Byrne aka Amon Byrne's dad, to the rescue and it turns out the ladies isn't ladies at all and instead those two were woman shinobi/ninja. jeez.... and then while the Queen's guard escorting the princess to Demonai camp, they were ambushed; all of them died save the princess who was dragged to be kill and torture by a psychopath who Raisa had melted his eye in the first book, Demon King. Raisa escaped because of Han's advice on knifing people still in her head and she ran away with a horse but then more assassins came at her with ratio 6 to one. Han on the other hand, had follow the trail straight to the dead bodies of the queen's guard and encountered Amon's dad's dead body and did some last rites over him in respect. 
 Then he found someone chasing after a girl with all cloaks and daggers and he think its unfair for people to bully a person like that, he arrowed all of them in the eye (which would have made the Windrun's "arrow in the knee" joke as second rate.) So, when he wanted to help the girl, he found instead, his sweetheart dying from a poisoned arrow. Ignoring his amulet's voice (Crow) to let the girl die, he end up using his power to transfer the poison into his body until they reached Demonai camp where his foster mam slash Dancer's mom, Willo, were able to save them. Raisa survived the wound in little side effect (like confusing the senses, hot water seems ice cold. Every sensation is like putting your skin against sandpaper etc) but Han was battling through the worst after effects of the poison. Later Han wake up and profess his love to Rebecca/Raisa who accepted him gingerly... and then he found out Rebecca/Raisa is in fact the princess of his country who he hated for causing (indirectly) everything he suffered in the first book.... 
 okay.. that was actually some several earlier chapters in the book.... the book is too long with too many stuff thats correlated to one another like a frickin Harry Potter books.... this book, is fortunately not a Harry Potter like the Exiled Queen. Instead its a love child between Game of Thrones - The Borgias - Skyrim and Earthsea anime meets Pride and Prejudice (ok, only the dancing part and some psychopath marriages part..). 
 Everyone is up to something. Everyone distrust one another. Wizard, nords, native Fells were *invisibly* fighting one another.. kinda like apartheid. There were people plotting. A lot of assassination attempts and many more. Its like reading through a car crash. Everyone is miserable and wanting to stab someone in the back. Wizards dying mysteriously. Forbidden romance that stretched a thousand year, and repeats. Jeez... I'm so glad this year's book is the final book of this series because I cant stand the never-ending canon of GRR Martin. 
 It might sound harsh when I say it was predictable but... take this, you know its going to happen anyway, the minor character gave clues!! Its like prolonging the inevitable but it still happen. Like its Queen Mariana's death... and three chapter later, too much thinking plotting and pondering... all that was within a day later)..... --> funeral. too many dots there... argh... you get that? Its like real time stuff of everything that happen. Just cut the chase will ya. 
 Overall... I like the series, truly. No underaged sex to jumble up and story fit seemingly. Clues are thrown while reading the book.. its fun. 
 But.. the politics of it was lengthy... but tolerable... I read a lot of fictional politics anyway. 
 Like I said, it was like watching a car crash. Its not a fairy tale. Its too stark and realist. 
 Final word of caution: 
 This is not a book for girls and young woman (insert this because I found out adults always rated badly in YA books but still read them.. jeez) who want to make a placard of Team Han and Team Amon stuff. 
 This is a book for those who like Fantasy genre but dislike the overbearing YA trends and can totally relate to some of the things that exist today... like Skyrim. I like you already if you play Elder Scrolls.