A Grave of Chains - A Grave of Chains, #1

A dark queer gothic fantasy romance about captivity, survival, and the slow, agonizing reclamation of the self.

Bodies can be broken, but souls can be destroyed.

Kowén is a gifted sculptor whose belief in compassion and love leads him into captivity. Drawn into the orbit of a seductive illusionist who whispers devotion while guiding him into the claws of a devil, Kowén trades freedom for belonging. What begins as protection, creativity, and desire curdles into possession. Love is weaponized. Autonomy is stripped away. Kowén is reshaped into something owned through manipulation and cruel intimacy.

Inside his shattered mind, another war unfolds.

Avyr, an incubus bound by mysterious purpose, wanders the ruins of Kowén's psyche. Through frozen memories, fractured timelines, and buried pain, he searches for the man lost beneath obedience and trauma. Reality fractures with illusion as angels, devils, and Death itself circle what remains of Kowén's soul, each claiming a different right to him.

A GRAVE OF CHAINS is a psychologically dark queer fantasy romance that refuses the fantasy of rescue. Instead, it explores survival when escape isn't possible—only endurance, resistance, and the brutal fight to reclaim one's identity from abuse disguised as love.

Told through a gay protagonist's perspective so often erased from narratives of trauma and survival, this gothic romantasy confronts manipulation, power imbalance, and ruinous devotion with unflinching intimacy. Dark, emotionally devastating, and deeply personal, it is a story of hope carved slowly from suffering.

This illustrated edition features 22 original gothic fantasy artworks by a tattoo artist, enhancing the novel's dark, visceral atmosphere.

This book is for readers who crave broken characters, gothic horror romance, angels and demons, psychological horror, and queer stories that survive the darkness instead of escaping it.