In a world where the magic you cast is restricted (on pain of death) by the role you must take, Krysilla Gillasin struggles to do her part as the wife of a baker. A baker, unfortunately, who no longer does any baking, leaving her exhausted from trying to run the business. When she meets a feverish minstrel, she ignores all consequence and brings him home instead of leaving him to die by the river's edge. Her husband, furious, demands he leave. Unwilling to turn a sick man out when he's still weak, Krysilla, for the first time, defies him. But the handsome minstrel has plans that go beyond music, and they include the secrets held within the chambers of a noble...and her own house. Now, she must choose between obedience and knowledge, between duty and freedom, between a living death and a life that might make her wish she were. Full of intrigue, adventure, and a dash of romance, The Baker's Wife (a serial novel in three parts) is the first in the Trial of the Ornic series.