Where Ash Meets Aether: a Steampunk Dark Fantasy Romance &

In a soot-choked city ruled by the Spire, Corinne survives by being the one thing the aristocracy fears most: a witch with an engineer’s mind. Her magic doesn’t whisper prayers—it reads systems, bends pressure, and makes metal obey.Varrus, the “Voice of Soot,” survives by hating everything the Spire stands for. He’s a revolutionary made of knives, rage, and grief—until the night the Spire sends magic-powered Enforcers crashing into his sanctuary and turns the gutters into a kill-zone.Now Corinne and Varrus are forced into the same fight: sabotage the Spire’s lifelines, slip into silk-and-steel galas, and strike at Archon Praxus—the calm monster behind the city’s oppression. But the deeper they dig, the stranger it gets: an Aether-Grid that feels alive, a humming power source buried in the bedrock, and a connection between them that tastes like ozone and copper.They should be enemies.They should be using each other.So why does every near-death moment pull them closer—until hate turns into something hungry, reckless, and impossible to undo?If they sever the Spire’s power, the city might finally breathe.If they fail, the Spire won’t just kill them… it will use them.A high-stakes steampunk romantasy filled with danger, revolution, and corrosive chemistry—perfect for readers who love dark atmospheres, ruthless villains, and romance forged under pressure.Tropes (bullet list)Enemies to loversForced proximity / uneasy allianceTouch-her-and-die protectionWounded antihero revolutionaryWitch/engineer heroine (magic-as-system)Gaslamp/steampunk city intrigueHigh society infiltration (gala)Found family / rebels (the Gutters)Oppressive regime + rebellionSlow-burn tension with explosive chemistry