Volume 1: The Clockwork Veil
On the 13th day of Emberwane, the stars fell.
They weren't meteors. Not fireballs or flaming rocks. No—the sky bled silver, and the stars didn't fall, they descended. Slowly. Quietly. As if something ancient had opened its eyes for the first time in a thousand years.
Kael Ardan stood on the rusted rooftop of the orphanage he'd called home for as long as he could remember. He was chewing on a slice of blackbread, staring at the sky with a blend of wonder and weariness. Astraven, the dying city of copper spires and smog, didn't stop for miracles. Steam-trams clattered, automaton guards clicked down alleyways, and somewhere far off, the hymn of the Clockwork Saint echoed like a lullaby for machines.
Then the raven came.
It landed beside Kael—silent, enormous, and glossy black. Its head turned too smoothly, unnaturally. Kael froze.
The bird had no eyes. Only dark hollows, swirling with ink-like shadows.
It dropped an envelope at his feet. Black, thick as leather, sealed with a sigil that shimmered and twisted like it was alive.
The moment his fingers brushed the envelope, the world seemed to still.
Inside, only a single line was written:
"You've seen it, haven't you? The door that watches back."
It wasn't just a metaphor. The phrase sent a prickling sensation down Kael's spine, like invisible eyes tracing his every breath. In the recesses of his mind, the words conjured an image—an immense door carved into the void, framed by serpentine runes and shifting shadows. But the truly terrifying part wasn't the door itself.
It was the sense that something behind it was aware of him.
Watching.
Waiting.
Not with malice. But with interest.
Kael stared. A chill ran down his spine.
When he looked up again, the raven was gone. But far on the horizon, where the sea kissed the stars, a spindly tower had appeared. Tall, impossible, crowned with a spiraling light like a lighthouse gazing straight at him.
He blinked—and it was gone.
But that night, something had changed. Something ancient had stirred.