I am so glad that I gave this book another chance. I tried to read it shortly after finishing book 2 and really struggled that they were the same timeline/events. But I really enjoyed the characters so I knew I always wanted to come back to it. And I'm so glad I did, I really loved it this time around. I would definitely recommend having a break between book 2 and this book though for max enjoyment. 
I absolutely adore both Zarrah and Keris. Their growth both individually and together is soooo good. I love that Keris isn't the stereotypical MMCs that we see so often. He is book smart and extremely intelligent. And I absolutely love him. Zarrahs character arc was also done so well, watching her grapple with what she's known her entire life to not be so black and white was amazing (and heartbreaking) to watch. 
I loved the aspect at the start of secret lovers not knowing each other's identity and felt it was done so well. 
This book is very court politics heavy, which I thought was fascinating. I think Danielle did an amazing job of both characters and court intrigue in this book. 
And that ending, I've got a feeling the next book is going to be absolutely epic. 

Oh it made me tear up/cry twice. 
Would have been a higher rating if not for the simultaneous timeline as previous book as personally I'm not a big fan when series do that. However the added insight to what happened was really cool - I would have preferred a multi pov in the one book as opposed to two seperate books. However that's just my personal preference.