Tharghon of Argmur

Tronakia, a great island divided between two powerful kingdoms — Sythia in the south and Varthar in the north — has known no other rulers for ten centuries. Their power rests not upon armies alone, but upon banks, coin, and shadow. Above every vault and every throne hangs the symbol of the ear, for these kingdoms hear all, buy all, and silence all. Yet beneath Mount Sharr, buried under stone and forgotten by those who fear to remember, lies Argmur — the golden city of the Nermount, the ancient house that once ruled all of Tronakia before it was betrayed, hunted, and erased from history. Guarding its depths is Dhurath, a serpent of living fire older than the kingdoms themselves, who opens the way for none but those who carry Nermount blood. And that blood still runs. Tharghon grows up in the shadow of a blacksmith's forge, raised by his grandfather Urtor, a man of few words and heavy silences. He does not know what he is. He knows only the weight of a hammer, the edge of a blade, and the feeling that the world holds a secret it refuses to speak aloud. But secrets do not stay buried. A letter, half-destroyed by salt and sea, arrives in the hands of two fishermen. A golden map, hidden beneath the mountain for ten centuries, waits for the touch of the only blood that can read it. And a general of Sythia's army, forged by war and carved by betrayal, is about to learn that the history he was never told is the only history that matters. Two kingdoms will stop at nothing to see the last of the Nermount dead. Tharghon has not yet begun to fight back.