The Archive of Borrowed Stars

Kael Veyr was born with a dead constellation in his soul—an omen that marks him as unteachable, powerless, and doomed to serve as a candle-scribe beneath the floating city of Luminara. When he accidentally awakens an illegal branch of magic that lets him borrow fragments of skill from the memories of the dead, Kael earns a place at the Astral Collegium, the empire’s most ruthless magic academy, where students forge spellcraft from living starlight and advancement is measured in orbiting sigils around the heart.

But Kael’s gift has a price: every borrowed talent leaves behind a ghostly debt, and the spirits he draws from are not content to remain silent. With the help of a disgraced duelist mentor, a rival princess hiding a forbidden weakness, and a half-mad archive familiar, Kael must climb the Collegium’s nine celestial ranks before the academy tournament exposes him.

Beyond the classrooms, ancient constellations are vanishing from the sky. Something is devouring the dead, the stars, and the magic between them—and Kael’s broken soul may be the only map to its hunger.