Love as the Foundation: Writing Healthy Relationships in Fantasy Romance

Why This Fantasy Romance Trilogy Chose Trust Over Toxicity 

When I began writing Legacy of the Four, I knew one thing with absolute certainty: love would be at the center of it.

Not just romantic love...but all of it.

Family love. Friendship. Loyalty. Chosen family. Canine companionship (because yes, dogs absolutely count). Young love, second-chance love, self-love, and that quiet, soul-deep platonic love that doesn't need romance to be profound.

I adore fantasy romance. I've devoured enemies-to-lovers stories like everyone else. They're sharp, exciting, and deliciously angsty. But as much fun as they are, I realized something while reading them: I didn't see enough healthy relationships in fantasy romance.

I wanted to write a story where love wasn't born from cruelty, manipulation, or constant volatility, but from trust. From knowing someone so deeply that even when the world is falling apart, that piece remains unshaken.

That's where Theo and Shade came in.

The Anchor in the Storm

Their love was never meant to be the storm.It was meant to be the immovable object inside it.

They fight. They disagree. They challenge each other. But their love is solid.

Unquestionable. 

The chaos around them can rage, territories can burn, fate can demand everything from them…but their love doesn't fracture under pressure. It anchors them.

And that mattered to me.

Love as the Backbone

Because I wanted love to be the backbone of the story, not something that distracted from the journey, but something that shaped the decisions within it. Love informed how they protected each other. How they sacrificed. How they chose again and again to keep going.

That intention carried through everything...including the physicality.

If I were going to write about love honestly, I couldn't shy away from where it naturally leads. Their intimacy wasn't included for shock value or spectacle. It wasn't there to overshadow the plot. It was there because for Theo and Shade, physical closeness is often how they show up for one another when words fall short.

Their connection, emotional and physical, is part of how they survive.

The sex isn't just sex.

It's reassurance. Grounding. A reminder that they're still here, still choosing each other, still human in a world that keeps asking them not to be.

Romance That Complements, Never Hijacks

At the same time, I was deeply intentional that the romance would never hijack the story. I didn't want readers pulled out of the journey for the sake of a scene. I wanted the love to complement the narrative, enhance it, add weight to it, make the stakes feel real.

These books take readers through dark places. Loss. Fear. Impossible choices. But love, every kind of it, makes the darkness survivable.

Love doesn't erase the pain.

It just makes it a little brighter to walk through.

That was always the heart of Legacy of the Four. And it's a heart I protect fiercely, because some stories aren't just about the battles we fight, but about the love that makes us fight at all.

Writing healthy relationships in fantasy romance isn't about removing conflict or tension. It's about creating characters whose foundation is strong enough to weather anything. Theo and Shade's relationship proves that trust, respect, and genuine connection can be just as compelling as enemies-to-lovers drama, maybe even more so.

Until our paths cross between realms,

J.F. Monroe