THE STARS REMEMBER EVERY BROKEN VOW.In the holy city of Helvar, oaths are carved into stone and burned into flesh. The Knights of the Star keep the peace with shining armor and sanctioned miracles-so long as no one asks what the Star really demands.Kael Renn has three simple rules: stay alive, stay paid, and stay far away from anything that looks like faith. Instead, he ends up with Astralore, an infamous Starforged sword that talks, remembers, and hates the men who once wielded it.When a split-second act of mercy in a bloodsport arena exposes a buried massacre, Kael is dragged into the Trial of Crowns: a sacred spectacle where champions fight, nations wager, and the gods are expected to stick to the script.At his side are the last people he ever meant to follow: Lysandra - a sharp-tongued princess with a talent for knives and politics, determined to break her kingdom before it breaks her.Toren - a weary ex-Knight who knows exactly how deep the Hall's rot runs...because he helped build it.Arien - the dead Knight bound inside Astralore, whose rage at his own order has had fifty years to sharpen.To survive the Trial, Kael has to do the one thing the Hall never trained its Knights for: turn mercy into heresy.As crowds chant his name and the crater at Helvar's heart wakes screaming, Kael digs into the Hall's most revered lies and the "saint" they built their power on. Every step closer to the truth puts a bigger target on his back-from fanatics who call themselves the true Hall, from nobles who like their faith bloody and profitable, and from the thing under the crater that may not be a god at all.If the Star is watching, it's about to learn something new.STARFORGED OATH is Book One of the Starforged Cycle, a character-driven epic fantasy full of bad decisions, holy conspiracies, and a sword with a long memory.Perfect for readers who love: - Razor-sharp banter and found-family dynamics in the middle of looming catastrophe.- Holy orders with dirty secrets, and the people brave (or foolish) enough to drag those secrets into the light.- Magic with consequences-where every vow, miracle, and vision leaves a mark.- Grim stakes without grimdark hopelessness: humor and heart threaded through blood, sweat, and bad ideas.- Sentient weapons that are as traumatized (and opinionated) as their wielders.Inside you'll find a talking Starforged sword that refuses to be anyone's holy relic, a Trial fought in a screaming crater while an entire city gambles on who lives and who dies, and a princess and a mercenary who both learned the same lesson from different sides of the blade: the people in power will write whatever story keeps them there.As the Trial spirals out of control, Kael must decide what he's willing to burn down-the Hall's legends, his own past, or the fragile trust of the people fighting beside him. Because Astralore isn't just a weapon. It's a witness. And once it remembers the truth about the "saint" it was forged from, it won't let the world forget.If you like epic fantasy where the holy sword argues with you, the princess has a knife up each sleeve and a plan behind every smile, and mercy is the most dangerous weapon on the field, STARFORGED OATH is ready to drag you into the crater.Book One tells a complete arc while opening the door to a larger war in the north-where more craters wait, more vows have been twisted, and the Star is no longer the only one watching.
