The Scent of Dead Magic

Some things should stay dead.

Kai Vale was once a rising star in luxury perfume, until his masterpiece, Before the Rain, destroyed his career and left a roomful of clients screaming about a burning city no one else could see.

Now he hides in a small antique fragrance shop in London, repairing dead bottles and pretending magic is gone.

It isn’t.

When a street drug called Moonmilk leaves a young woman dead with a silver leaf growing from her tongue, the Narcotics Irregularities Unit drags Kai back into a hidden world of failed spells, illegal potions, cold-silver evidence boxes, secret clinics, and old families who learned to sell what survived the Great Dimming.

Kai can smell magic.

And this case smells like his past.

The victims are whispering the name of Aurelian Sablemere, the Last Mage, officially recorded as dead when magic broke. The Conservatory wants what remains of him. Someone is using bodies as containers. And Kai may be more than a witness to the resurrection of dead magic.

He may be the door.

The Scent of Dead Magic is a modern dark fantasy mystery about a disgraced perfumer, magical narcotics, secret medical cults, and the terrible things people do when they mistake resurrection for progress.

What to expect:

Scent-based magic in modern LondonA ruined perfumer with a supernatural noseIllegal potions, secret clinics, old bottles, and cold-silver containmentBody horror, mystery, dry humour, and dead magic that refuses to stay deadNo litRPG, no system, no harem