Vows Written in Venom
Elara Vance has hidden the serpent mark on her wrist since childhood, the living proof of a bloodline bound by vow to the Wraith-King, an ancient horror waiting beneath the ash for his promised bride. When her illegitimate child, the fatherless, the heir to a curse no one is meant to know, draws the hunt of Lord Caelum Ravenscar, a cold and powerful noble who has spent decades hunting her kind, Elara's careful concealment begins to unravel. Desperate and out of options, she seeks Maris the Hedge-Witch, whose remedies always come weighted with consequence, and Grandmother Ashvale, whose brittle silence hides generations of dangerous truth. Fen, the scarred blacksmith's son who has loved Elara in silence for as long as anyone can remember, offers her the one thing she never expected: a future untouched by the old dark. But Fen carries a secret of his own, one that ties him to Lord Ravenscar's cause and to the Cursed Child's awakening power. As the Wraith-King stirs beneath the rain-black roads and the Mirror-Woman's curse begins stealing reflections from the living, Master Orin's warnings grow louder: every vow written in venom must someday be paid. To save her child, Elara must either surrender the man she loves to the darkness that shaped her bloodline, or break the ancient covenant and unleash a horror the world has long forgotten how to name.