Publisher's Synopsis
In a world where faith is both weapon and curse, where monsters and men blur into the same damned creatures, and where redemption is as fleeting as the breath of a dying god, The Binding of Souls weaves an unforgettable tale of fate, vengeance, and the eternal war between what is and what could be.
At the heart of this grim, haunting tale stands Asceo Valtheris, a man who was once a scholar, a seeker of knowledge, a mortal bound to ink and paper. But knowledge could not save him from the night that remade him, from the darkness that swallowed his name, his soul, his very place in the world. Turned against his will, cursed with an endless hunger and an existence that should not be, he has spent centuries walking a road paved with blood and regret.
Yet, Asceo is not like others of his kind. He does not revel in the slaughter, does not embrace the beast that lurks beneath his skin. He does not drink freely from the living, nor claim dominion over the mortals who scurry beneath the weight of empires and gods alike. Instead, he hunts something worse.
For beyond the veil of human understanding, beyond the fears whispered in holy corridors, there are things more terrible than vampires-things that do not merely kill, but devour, that do not seek flesh, but suffering. Demons. Beasts that feast upon the essence of the soul itself.
It is they whom Asceo hunts. Not as a knight in shining armor, not as some misguided champion seeking absolution, but because it is the only thing that makes his cursed existence bearable. The only thing that keeps him from becoming what he despises most.
But the world does not see him as its savior. The Church, ever watchful, sees no difference between the monsters he slays and the monster he has become. And so, he is hunted. A heresy upon the land, a blight that must be purged, an abomination wearing the face of a man.
Then, amidst the ruins of war and the whispers of something ancient stirring in the darkness, he hears a name.
A priest unlike the others.
A man who does not wield faith as a blade, who does not condemn with fire and steel, but who-against all reason-questions.
Veylan is no ordinary man of God. Where others burn first and speak never, he listens. He doubts. He walks the razor's edge between righteousness and heresy, searching for truths the Church has buried beneath centuries of blind obedience. And now, his search has led him to the very thing the world has told him should not exist-a monster who refuses to be a monster.
Their meeting is not fate. It is not prophecy. It is a collision-two forces that should never have touched, two enemies bound by a single, impossible thread.
Veylan does not offer salvation. He does not offer forgiveness. But he offers something else.
A purpose.
Something is coming. Something old. Something neither vampire nor man can stand against alone. And when the time comes, when the dark tide rises and the world trembles beneath the weight of what has been waiting in the shadows, there will be only one question left to answer:
Will Asceo stand beside him, or against him?
A sweeping, gothic epic of faith and damnation, of predators and prey, The Binding of Souls is a tale of uneasy alliances, shattered beliefs, and the fragile, dangerous thing that lingers between hope and despair. For in the end, it is not just the living who pray for salvation.
