Spy and Guardian (Beth Revis) Books in Order

Spy and Guardian drops you into the court of Mary Queen of Scots and immediately makes it clear that almost nobody can move through this world safely. Politics are unstable, loyalties are hidden, and magic is woven straight into the danger. This is historical romantasy with spies, curses, and fae threats all sharing the same cramped hallways.

Samson Calthorpe comes to the story from the streets of London. He is carrying a curse that has left him isolated from the people around him, and when a chance appears to break it, he takes the job that comes with it: become a royal spy and infiltrate the Scottish court. His mission is political on the surface, but the deeper he gets, the clearer it becomes that ordinary intrigue is only one layer of the problem.

Alyth Graham is dealing with a different version of the same danger. She is a guardian sworn to protect Mary, and she is also the daughter of a fae prince and a human mother. That makes her one of the people standing between Scotland and the Red Caps, a brutal fae clan tied to an even bigger threat. Alyth already knows the court is dangerous. Samson arrives just in time to make it more complicated.

The two leads do not begin on the same side, and that is a big part of the fun. They are working different angles, holding different secrets, and both have good reasons to be suspicious. Their chemistry grows out of that tension. So does the plot. The books keep using hidden messages, shifting alliances, and divided duty to push them together and pull them apart.

The first book, The Crimson Throne, is the most court-centered, with much of its energy coming from surveillance, codes, Lord Darnley's schemes, and the question of who is really using whom. The second book, The Blood Queen, opens the danger wider. What starts as a fight over one court and one marriage becomes a struggle that reaches into the fae world and the future of both mortal and magical realms.

Expect a series that likes its romance sharp, its politics tense, and its fantasy rooted in a setting that already feels volatile before the magic enters. If you want glamorous court surfaces, real peril underneath them, and two leads who have to build trust while everything around them is trying to break it, this duology has a strong grip.