What happened in The Crown's Game by Evelyn Skye - Recaptains

The basics

Title: The Crown’s Game

Author: Evelyn Skye

Series: The Crown's Game #1

- The Crown's Game (2016)
- The Crown's Fate (2017)

Add it: Goodreads

Goodreads Summary:

Vika Andreyeva can summon the snow and turn ash into gold. Nikolai Karimov can see through walls and conjure bridges out of thin air. They are enchanters—the only two in Russia—and with the Ottoman Empire and the Kazakhs threatening, the tsar needs a powerful enchanter by his side.

And so he initiates the Crown’s Game, an ancient duel of magical skill—the greatest test an enchanter will ever know. The victor becomes the Imperial Enchanter and the tsar’s most respected adviser. The defeated is sentenced to death.

Raised on tiny Ovchinin Island her whole life, Vika is eager for the chance to show off her talent in the grand capital of Saint Petersburg. But can she kill another enchanter—even when his magic calls to her like nothing else ever has?

For Nikolai, an orphan, the Crown’s Game is the chance of a lifetime. But his deadly opponent is a force to be reckoned with—beautiful, whip-smart, imaginative—and he can’t stop thinking about her.

And when Pasha, Nikolai’s best friend and heir to the throne, also starts to fall for the mysterious enchantress, Nikolai must defeat the girl they both love…or be killed himself.

As long-buried secrets emerge, threatening the future of the empire, it becomes dangerously clear—the Crown’s Game is not one to lose.

Read a full summary of The Crown’s Game by Evelyn Skye below. If you can’t remember what happened in The Crown’s Game and you need a refresher, then you’re in the right place.

What happened in The Crown’s Game?

• We’re introduced to Vika, who is learning to summon lightning properly. She’s practising so that she’ll be able to serve the tsar.
• We meet Nikolai, who’s an enchanter, and he’s working on creating a magical suit.
• Galina tasks Nikolai with reshelving books at the library. This takes him a few hours.
• Pasha arrives home, and he learns that the locals are planning a revolt against the kingdom.
• Pasha’s sister asks their father about the Crown’s Game, and suggests that it could be presented on Pasha’s birthday.
• Nikolai and Pasha go to Ovchinin Island to hunt. Here, they come across a girl (Vika) messing about with lightning. They try to help her, but she freezes them so they can’t follow her as she runs away.
• Vika’s father Sergei receives a note that says Vika will have to battle another enchanter. He’s annoyed because he wasn’t told about this before. His sister, Galina, could have told him that she had an apprentice.
• Nikolai has been told by Renata that death follows him. He speaks to her about coming across the lightning girl in the woods, and admits that he is nervous about battling her.
• Pasha researches enchanters to try to understand what happened between them and the girl.
• Sergei and Vika plan to leave the following day to take part in the Crown’s Game.
• Galina makes Nikolai kill wild animals as practise for his battle with Vika.
• The four of them – Galina, Nikolai, Sergei, and Vika – arrive to take the oath. Nikolai and Vika make themselves invisibile.
• The tsar begins the Game.
• Vika and Nikolai follow the tsar to an enchanted mountain where he explains the Game to them. They both take the oath, and are scarred. These scars will burn when it’s their turn to play.
• A woman called Aizhana is brought back to life. She doesn’t know how this has happened.
• Pasha is still looking into who the girl from the woods is. He discovers that it’s Vika, who has just left with Sergei.
• Kicking the Game off, Nikolai messes with some building facades – he creates stone birds that attack Vika. Vika manages to fight them off and destroy them.
• While Pasha and his family are touring the city, someone comes along and starts shouting at them. Pasha asks his father to pardon the man, and the tsar doesn’t like how his son isn’t tough like he is.
• For her first trick, Vika messes with the water in the fountains. The water attacks Nikolai until Vika runs out of steam. To top it off, she turns the water into rainbow colours.
• Nikolai tells Pasha that magic exists and that’s the explanation for what has been going on.
• During an argument, Galina tells Sergei that she knows that Vika isn’t biologically related to him.
• Aizhana is walking around a village looking for her child. She tells the story of how she had a child with a Russian soldier, and the child was taken away by an aristocrat because he had powers. Aizhana becomes more powerful after killing people.
• Ludmila goes to stay with Vika.
• Vika comes across two boxes that have been put in front of the palace. Once she opens them, the jack-in-the-box and ballerina start to dance around the room and trap Vika in one of the boxes. She escapes.
• Vika creates a storm that Nikolai protects everyone from using a shielf.
• Pasha invites Vika to the royal ball through Ludmila.
• Renata is sent to spy on Vika. She tells Nikolai that Vika has been invited to the royal ball.
• An imagination box is delivered to Vika’s apartment. Vika doesn’t want to use it because it seems to be from Nikolai.
• Ludmila tells Vika that Pasha is looking for her.
• Nikolai dances with Renata at the ball, and Pasha dances with Vika. They then swap partners.
• Sergei has been giving Vika energy through a bracelet, but it’s weakening him as a result.
• Nikolai’s scar burns, and he discovers that an island has appeared out of nowhere.
• Vika asks Renata to read her tea leaves. Renata tells her that death is near, but fails to mention that love will always come with suffering. Aizhana hears Renata speaking to Vika, and learns that Nikolai, her son, is in a contest. She wants to kill the tsar to protect her son.
• Nikolai goes to the island and creates a dock and some benches. He falls asleep. Vika goes over there and sees what Nikolai has made. She sits on one of the benches and she is teleported to Moscow. She tests out the benches and finds Nikolai asleep on one of them. She touches his cheek and enters his dreams.
• Renata tells Nikolai she loves him.
• Pasha tries to get with Vika but she tells him she’s not interested.
• Pasha’s mother’s health takes a turn for the worst and the tsar asks Vika to get them to the south.
• Sergei dies after giving Vika too much of his power.
• Vika passes out.
• Aizhana follows the tsar south.
• Galina writes to Vika and tells her about Sergei’s death, and also that he adopted Vik after he found her on a volcano.
• Pasha tells Nikolai that he almost kissed Vika, and he wants her to win the competition. Nikolai tells him he can’t interfere.
• Ludmila asks Pasha to distract Vika from her father’s death. Pasha takes Vika to his summer home, and he spots a scar on her shoulder that glows.
• Pasha asks Vika about the game. Nikolai reveals that he’s the second enchanter and Pasha gets upset, telling Nikolai that he wants nothing to do with him.
• Vika magics up some animals and sends them to kill Nikolai, but she stops them at the last minute after admitting that she fancies Nikolai.
• Nikolai goes out drinking and returned hungover the next morning.
• Aizhana visits the tsar in his tent and tells him Nikolai is their son. Aizhana kisses the tsar, and infects him with typhus. Lol. He dies, along with the tsarina.
• Pasha and Yuliana hear about their parents, and Pasha becomes tsar.
• Yuliana tells Pasha that he should stop the Game.
• Pasha brings Vika and Nikolai to him, and insists that they finish the Game. He wants them to fight to the death.
• Vika leaves the castle without speaking to Nikolai.
• Aizhana speaks to Nikolai and tells him that his father was the tsar, and that she murdered him.
• Nikolai finds Renata and Ludmila in cages.
• Nikolai and Vika go off to duel, and Nikolai stabs himself with a knife. It turns out that Galina enchanted the knife to kill Vika, so Vika is wounded instead. Nikolai tries to heal Vika and apparently dies.
• Pasha falls ill. He learns that Vika won the Game and starts to cry.
• Pasha holds a memorial service for Nikolai.
• Vika can feel Nikolai’s magic still around. She sees Nikolai in the distance riding a horse.

This is a full plot summary of what happened in The Crown’s Game by Evelyn Skye. Check out our recap list for more recaps. If you can’t find what you need, you can request a recap from us!