Kepstadur Keep
a debut fantasy novel
Sonja and her sister vowed to pay anything to revive their little brother, even if their own blood is the currency. After years chasing folktales, a single rumor remains:
Kepstadur Keep.
This once-decadent port rots at the far edge of their home country, harboring memories of the lost or forgotten. With the help of a foreign mercenary, Sonja dares to pluck at the strands of Kepstadur’s magic, risking her life to understand its secrets.
But something malevolent lurks in the depths. If the castle proves itself more clever, Sonja could lose more than a brother to death’s soft voice.
all magic has a price.
What to Expect
great for readers who love...
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character-driven narratives
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blood magic with sentience
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ambient worldbuilding
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sword and sorcery fantasy
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coping with dry humor
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multicultural melting pots
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existential musings on death
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perhaps a single smooch
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cool castles that may kill you
Meet the Cast
Sonja Vinzler
the alternator
Sonja was always the most contentable of the three. While she didn’t see herself as particularly powerful, especially when compared to her brother, she did believe the power she had would be able to help her family as she got older. She tries not to think about the time spent with her first tutors, the Myrhs. So she moved on as best she could. She fell in love with a traveling salesman. But he left her less than a month before their wedding. Was something wrong with her? Did she not do enough? He never replied to her letters, so she never got an explanation. Left to endlessly wonder. She vowed to make herself more useful, harder to leave.
Niccolo son Catalin
the mercenary
Niccolo grew up in a simpler place. Not that magic didn't exist, but that it wasn't a factor in his everyday life. Not that war didn't exist, but that no one he knew was fighting. Until he was drafted. He was young and scared and just tried to put on a brave face. He and Castillo bonded over their shared hometown. They helped each other stay brave. They made great strides toward reaching out to other young, scared recruits, most notably Adelma. But as Castillo became more entrenched in the military ideology, Niccolo grew disillusioned with the violence. He quietly considered desertion. When Ziania burned, he knew it was too late.
Thonra Vinzler
the illusionist
In an age where magic was still new, Thonra grew up surrounded by it. Her grandparents’ vineyard owed its success to risky energy magic. All the same, her parents tried to shield the children until they could afford to buy into the new industry of magical tutors. But with new developments come new grifters, and the first set of tutors were just that. While Thonra herself didn’t attract the unwanted attention of the Myhrs due to her abrasive attitude, both of her siblings did. She blames herself for not noticing soon enough and speaking up to protect them. As the oldest, she takes responsibility for letting the abuse continue so long.
Map of the Northwestern Trade Union
art by the author
Jrendavarian Magic
Magic is still a budding entity, something that the world has yet to fully understand. Jrendavar, the nation where our story takes place, is one of the leading nations in magical discover and education. While it's still at a rudimentary understanding, fatality rates have seen a great decline, though the elite still keep many of the secrets to themselves. The wealthy few who can afford tutors and schooling learn about the three types of magic as listed below, though there are still edge cases that the world has yet to quantify.
At the most fundamental level, scholars understand that there are levels to magic. Some spells are inherently riskier than others, though the abilities of the user can have an effect on this "cost" as well. Most mages can be split into Alternators or Illusionists. However, recent years have seen a rise in people capable of accessing both styles of magic -- commonly known as "Variants."
Modern scholarship is currently investing its time into understanding what role relics, runes, and glyphs play into this ecosystem, but there are even more instances of magic that are far less understood.
Alterations:
Energy Spells
Identification: $
visualizing individual energies or connections.
Example:
Caster gains a second sight to see which leafs fell from the same tree. Related objects share a similar signature and thin connective lines.
Manipulation: $$
temporarily alter an object’s physical or energetic nature.
Example:
Caster touches a falling leaf, causing it to increase or decrease in weight for a set time. Anyone lifting the object would feel the effect.
Sympathetic: $$$
use identification and manipulation together to transfer an effect from one object to another.
Example:
One leaf is on fire. Using the energetic connection, the caster may share that energy to ignite a branch from the same tree. The closer the two objects, the easier they are to link.
Illusions:
Perception Spells
Hallucination: $
imprint a sound, sensation, or image into select mind.
Example:
One target sees and hears a horse prance through their house. There is no horse, and no one else can see or hear outside of specified targets.
Illusion: $$
project a sound, sensation, or image into a set space.
Example:
Everyone in the room can see a projection of a horse prances in the house. There is no horse, it cannot touch anything, but anyone can see and hear it.
Manifestation: $$$
temporarily form a frail physical object into existence.
Example:
There is now a horse in your house. It can interact with physical objects. Anyone nearby can see it, but if it is struck too hard by physical object, it will puff into a blue-ish purple dust. The dust disappears after a few moments.
Glyphs, Runes, & Magic Items
Carved, written, stitched, etc. focuses using phonetic symbols. Best for single syllable words, as the single prominent vowel sound acts as the glyph base.
Glyphs for inflection-heavy languages are almost completely different from those without.
Example:
A glyph for "money" may be written as "pay." A glyph for "wellness" is better as "health."
Fjarfest:
powerful objects with lasting, invested magic. Even weak fjarfest are uncommon. It's hard to make magic remain behind indefinitely.
Vel:
mundane objects that aid in magic. Often grounding elements that distribute the energy in use, best implemented through three-point structures.
From conception to outline, text to edits, cover to character art, and everything in between, Kepstadur Keep is a fully human work.
ART IS HUMAN.
DOWN WITH THE MACHINE.