Game of the Shadowed Crown (The Storm Singer, #1)

Some games are played for gold. Others for glory. But this one—this one plays for souls.
Kaiven never asked for a legacy. He never asked for the past. But when a storm shattered the quiet stillness of Duskmoore, it brought more than wind and rain—it brought a reckoning.
It began with a knock in the dead of night.
At his door stood a cloaked messenger, rain-soaked and silent, bearing two relics thought long lost:
A wide-brimmed, sea-salted hat still haunted by the scent of brine and memory...
And a weathered journal, once belonging to Seamus—the grandfather who vanished into legend.
For weeks the journal remained shut. Until one night, under a sky torn by stormlight, the ink began to move.
Words shifted. Pages bled secrets. And a message, hidden and waiting, surfaced—written not just for someone, but for Kaiven.
That moment cracked the world open.
What followed was no mere journey—it was an unraveling. A trail of riddles and ruins, seers and symbols, whispers in stone and wind. Why did Seamus vanish? What truths did he bury in the journal's cryptic script? And what ancient force now stirs in Kaiven's blood?
With nothing but fragments to follow, Kaiven ventures inland—into a realm where shadows remember, rivers hum with forgotten songs, and old runes pulse with truths too dangerous to name.
By his side:
Muffin, a soft-feathered puffin who dreams of naps, snacks, and ghost-free days—but who follows Kaiven into madness anyway.
Einog, a silent sheep whose gaze carries the weight of lifetimes, and whose past is guarded like a locked gate.
Salty, a one-eyed gull and self-declared "Storyteller of the Seven Currents," who spins tall tales and sharp truths alike.
Together, they chase a myth buried beneath myth:
The Game of the Shadowed Crown—a secret contest forged between two celestial beings:
Lunaris, bearer of divine light.
Noctirion, lord of the fallen dark.
The Game tests chosen souls across unseen realms of illusion, memory, and fate. Its rules are unknown. Its prize, unimaginable. And Kaiven? He might not be a player at all...
But the key to ending it.
What begins as a search for family becomes a battle for truth, identity, and the fate of all who walk beneath starlight. With every step, Kaiven draws closer to an answer he may not be ready to face.
Because in this Game, every move has a cost. And not every soul is meant to survive the board.
Game of the Shadowed Crown is the lyrical, spellbinding opening to Kaiven's Chronicles, a saga of riddles, relics, soul-bound destinies, and the quiet courage that changes everything.
For fans of The Name of the Wind, Watership Down, and The Silmarillion—this is a tale of myth reborn, of mystery unfurled, and a golden hare who must walk the line between legend and oblivion.

Mars Algiros writes at the edge of shadow and starlight.
Blending haunting mystery with rich mythology, Algiros crafts stories where cursed mirrors whisper secrets, golden hares race against fate, and forgotten legends claw their way back into the world. With a voice both poetic and cinematic, Mars draws readers into realms where the stakes are eternal and the game is never what it seems.
Born with a love for forgotten paths and half-buried truths, Algiros believes the most powerful stories are the ones that ask us to look deeper—into history, into myth, and into ourselves.
When not writing, Mars can be found chasing strange dreams, sketching maps of places that don't exist (yet), or disappearing into antique shops in search of echoes.