The Heir of Ash and Thunder (The Shattered Veil #1) by Elijah Stepanovich

Some destinies burn their way into the world. Ilija Dragović has spent his life studying myths he doesn't quite believe. As a professor of classical mythology, he walks among ancient ruins with a strange, unsettling familiarity, as though something within him remembers what his mind cannot. He has buried the memory of the night his father died, when he was seventeen and five flames appeared in the darkness. He tells himself it was grief, trauma, a child's mind breaking under loss. Then the presence he's always carried beneath his skin begins to wake. It rises as heat in his blood, as light behind his eyes, as a voice that feels like coming home. The world leans toward him in recognition, and Ilija realizes the myths he's taught aren't stories at all, but memories of a life lived when empires rose at his command. Across sea and stone, ancient powers turn their attention toward him. They remember him as beloved, as rival, as ruin. They are coming to witness his return, to challenge him, to kneel, to kill. As the ancient storm he once wielded returns to his hands, Ilija must face an impossible choice: reclaim the power that could reshape the world, or resist the destiny that's already rewriting him from within. The Heir of Ash and Thunder is a tale of awakening and defiance, where memory is both weapon and wound, and the past refuses to stay buried.

Adult • Fantasy • Fantasy/Mythic, Retelling, and Folklore • Fantasy/Epic and High • Fantasy/Romantic and Erotic • Fantasy/Dark

Content Warning: Death, Gore, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Vomit, War, Injury/Injury detail, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Torture, Grief, mentions of Genocide.