A Veil Of Stardust And Savagery

War. War is all we know. War for peace, war to take, war to protect. War for resources. It is impossible to avoid war because your neighbors won’t. If you are perceived as weak, you will be targeted. Your land and wealth stolen, your people killed, sons enslaved and daughters raped. To survive in this world, more important than oxygen; is strength and a cold heart. The only source of strength are mana veins. He who owns mana veins has the right to live and the right to rule. He who owns mana veins better have the strength to keep it or long life is but a pipe dream. Xasha hated war. War had taken everything from him and gave nothing in return. He hated that all wars were over petty things like pride and pocket change. He always looked to the vast wilderness with longing. He wondered why all the warmongers hadn’t turned their spears there. Where vast lands and untapped wealth were. Once he became a father. Xasha, the naïve, knowledge-loving merchant, decided he did not want his child growing up in the same world he did. He decided to change the world, end all war and unite the abandoned region. How will he do it? By starting a war, a war that will end all wars. Not a war with his neighbors over pride or a few mana veins. No. He will rage against the wilderness and the world beyond.

My mother fell critically ill and was rushed to the hospital. Desperate, I knelt before my fiancé—the department's chief surgeon—and begged him to take charge of her operation. But outside the ICU, he was carefully tending to a scraped knee. Lucy Wendell's scraped knee, to be exact. Just as I was drowning in hopelessness, Cameron Mitchell—the hospital director and my childhood friend—pushed open the operating room doors and handed me a marriage proposal. "Marry me, and I'll personally perform your mother's surgery." With trembling hands, I signed my name, clinging to the last shred of hope that she could be saved. But she never made it through that stormy night. Cameron handled all the funeral arrangements himself, and our wedding proceeded as scheduled. Seven years later, in the hushed silence of the hospital archives, I overheard Cameron speaking with the deputy director. "Cameron, why did you transfer your mother-in-law's organ to Lucy's mother during that surgery? Weren't you afraid of getting caught?" "I owed Lucy," he replied. "If I hadn't hesitated back then, Lucy never would've chosen medical aid work in Africa… and her mother wouldn't have fallen ill from the grief."

Would you fall in love with someone whose face you've never seen? Why does she captivate him so completely, even though all he has glimpsed are her eyes, peering through the veil’s delicate fabric? What secrets lie beneath? What past does she hide? Every detail about this woman is wrapped in mystery—unspoken truths, carefully guarded omissions, and a silence that speaks louder than words. A veil. A past. Secrets. A love that defies the odds. Are you ready to unravel the mystery behind the veil?

In the remote town of Black Hollow, death wears the mask of wolves—but the truth is far darker. Dr. Evelyn Hart, a brilliant but skeptical forensic pathologist, is sent from the city to investigate a string of brutal killings. The townsfolk whisper about curses, ancient legends, and a beast that stalks beneath the full moon. Evelyn trusts science, not superstition. But when claw marks gouge trees higher than any wolf could reach, when the dead are crushed with impossible force, and when glowing eyes stare back at her in the forest, her certainty begins to fracture. Drawn into a chilling web of blood, folklore, and fate, Evelyn discovers she bears a mark older than the town itself—a mark that ties her to a man both dangerous and magnetic, a man who claims she was destined to be his mate. As her body betrays her and the wolf within claws free, she must choose: cling to the human life she built… or embrace the monstrous destiny that waits under the moon.

Elara Nightingale has a secret—she can see everyone's emotions as colorful auras. Everyone except Cain Blackwood, the mysterious man who returns to their small coastal town after ten years away. When Cain's mother starts making threats about an upcoming event called "the Convergence," Elara discovers her quiet life running the family bookstore has been built on lies. Her parents weren't just booksellers—they were magical guardians protecting the town from a darkness that emerges every 93 years when the barrier between worlds thins. Now that darkness is returning, stronger than ever. And according to town librarian Mrs. Holloway, only Elara and Cain can stop it. As magical attacks force them into hiding, Elara and Cain must learn to control their complementary powers—her ability to see beyond normal perception and his power to create protective shields. Their families have been performing a ritual for generations that temporarily contains the darkness, but it comes with a terrible price: binding their life forces together permanently. Elara's parents died trying to find another way. Now she and Cain must finish what they started—a purification ritual using a mysterious crystal called the Lens. While training together in a remote cabin, their initial distrust turns to friendship, then to something deeper. But Cain's power-hungry mother is determined to perform the traditional ritual, even if it means killing Elara. As the Convergence approaches and strange phenomena plague the town, Elara and Cain must race to decipher hidden clues, navigate secret tunnels beneath the town, and prepare for a magical showdown in the chamber beneath the lighthouse. When the stars finally align, they'll face a choice: follow tradition and be bound forever by duty, or risk everything on a new path—one where they choose each other freely, transforming darkness into light through the most powerful magic of all.

Evelina Dray: I have spent years cataloging what Obscura wanted forgotten. Erased names. Broken prophecies. Bloodlines rewritten by fear. Knowledge is supposed to be neutral, but I’ve learned that every truth has a cost, and someone always bleeds for it. Draven Kael is not a secret I was meant to find. He is a weapon the world buried and prayed would stay buried. He should terrify me. He does. But fear has never stopped me from opening a door. The Interregnum believes I will choose safety. Obscura believes I will choose loyalty. They are wrong. I will choose the truth, even if it burns everything I am standing on. Draven Kael: They call me a monster because it’s easier than admitting they built me this way. I was forged to kill dragons, to end bloodlines, to erase problems before they learned how to scream. The Interregnum didn’t give me purpose. It gave me permission. Evelina Dray is not supposed to see me. She looks anyway. She doesn’t flinch when she learns what I am, what I’ve done, what I was designed to destroy. That makes her dangerous. That makes her mine. This war is not ending. Not here. Not now. And when the world finally tears itself open, it won’t be heroes who decide what survives. It will be the weapons that were never meant to love anything at all.