International Kindle Paperwhite
Kindle Unlimited
Unlimited reading. Over 5 million titles. Learn more
Read for Free
OR
EUR 2.53 with 80 percent savings
Print List Price: EUR 12.67
You will be charged USD 2.99

Promotions apply when you purchase

These promotions will be applied to this item:

Some promotions may be combined; others are not eligible to be combined with other offers. For details, please see the Terms & Conditions associated with these promotions.

Sold by Amazon.com Services LLC.
You've subscribed to ! We will preorder your items within 24 hours of when they become available. When new books are released, we'll charge your default payment method for the lowest price available during the pre-order period.
Update your device or payment method, cancel individual pre-orders or your subscription at
Your Memberships & Subscriptions

Buy for others

Give as a gift or purchase for a team or group.
Learn more

How it works

  1. Choose your delivery method
  2. Send now or schedule for later
  3. Add your personal message
  4. Recipients can read on any device

These ebooks can only be redeemed by recipients in the US. Redemption links and eBooks cannot be resold.

Added to

Sorry, there was a problem.

There was an error retrieving your Wish Lists. Please try again.

Sorry, there was a problem.

List unavailable.
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

  • Duke Rhime of the Spire: A Gothic Dark Fantasy (Absolution of the Morning Star)

Follow the author

Get new release updates & improved recommendations
Scott Tirrell
Follow
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

Duke Rhime of the Spire: A Gothic Dark Fantasy (Absolution of the Morning Star) Kindle Edition

by Scott A. Tirrell (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.6 out of 5 stars (3)

A Dark Gothic Fantasy of Court Intrigue and Forbidden Power

Eldenspire rises against the horizon like an ungodly pine—ancient, twisted, and clawing at the sky.

Evaline is sent to this dark castle as payment for a debt her house cannot repay with coin, bound in marriage to Duke Rhime: brilliant, feared, and dangerously indispensable to a kingdom already cracking at its seams. In his court, vows are leverage, kinship is currency, and mercy is rarely free.

Across Rhime’s lands, the rot is spreading. Nobles vanish. Villages wake screaming from the same shared nightmare. Rumors gather around the Spire’s sick red pulse and the forbidden work said to be waking beneath it. The Duke’s shadowed power is becoming harder to disguise—and harder to control. Whether Rhime is mastering the darkness or being mastered by it, the court is waiting for a slip.

The wedding may be that moment.

Because in a kingdom built on brittle alliances, a single night of ceremony can become a turning point—one that shifts loyalties, stains hands, and leaves no one unchanged. When factions tighten their grip and the throne suddenly feels close enough to touch, Evaline is dragged into the violent arithmetic of rule: bargains, betrayals, and choices that cannot be undone.

To survive, she must learn the language of power.
To wield it, she may have to become someone the dark castle can recognize.

Because the Spire doesn’t care who serves it. It only cares that its will is done.

Some towers are built to protect. This one was built to keep something within. And it is waking, hungry to feed upon Lucardia again.

Read more
Previous slide of product details
  1. Print length
    364 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Accessibility
    Learn more
  4. Publication date
    July 29, 2025
  5. File size
    3.4 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
  7. Word Wise
    Enabled
  8. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
Next slide of product details

From the Publisher

The Lucardian World branding

She was given as a bride to pay a debt—what she became would change the fate of an empire.

At the heart of the Lucardian world is the Absolution of the Morning Star series, but many stories haunt its edges. Duke Rhime of the Spire is a foundational entry in the Lucardian mythos, serving as an origin story for one of the realm’s most pivotal and enigmatic figures told through the eyes of his bride, Evaline Lysena.

Set centuries before the events of Absolution of the Morning Star, the book chronicles Rhime’s rise from the Duke of Eldenspire to the second Uniter of Lucardia, establishing the bloodline and ideological fractures that echo through the empire’s later history. It explores the early political and supernatural tensions between the Westerly Kingdom and the rest of Lucardia, revealing the roots of the eventual collapse of the Five Kingdoms period. Through its intimate focus on Rhime and Evaline's relationship, the book deepens the world’s mythology, expanding on the origins of both the Battenborne and Zulikaarme lines, the power behind Eldenspire, and the dark forces that shape Lucardia’s future.

Evaline Lysena

Evaline Lysena

Evaline is the second daughter of a minor noble house. She is married off to the enigmatic and feared Duke Rhime of Eldenspire to settle her father’s debts. Young, clever, and brave, she finds herself trapped in a cold, political marriage where love is not immediately evident and secrets abound. As she uncovers the truth about the dark powers at Rhime's command, Evaline must choose between survival and sacrifice. Her journey marks the beginning of a descent into the heart of Lucardia’s most treacherous ambitions at the fiery end of the Five Kingdoms period.

Duke Rhime

Duke Rhime Battenborne

Rhime is the enigmatic head of the Battenborne family, feared for both his ruthless ambition and whispered command of sorcery. He rules from the towering fortress of Eldenspire, a place as ominous and unyielding as the man himself. Bound by duty and secrets, he marries Evaline of Lysena to settle a debt, dragging her into the shadowy depths of his rise to power. Rhime’s quiet intensity masks a dangerous intellect and a growing hunger for dominion, marking him as a key architect in Lucardia’s darkest transformations.

Eldenspire

Eldenspire

Eldenspire is the heart of the Westerly Kingdom in the land of Lucardia, a dark and imposing fortress marked by its single towering spire and surrounded by a grim urban sprawl. Perched near the edge of the Great Step—a high plateau ridge that forms a natural wall between Lucardia and the vast, scorched Wastelands—Eldenspire serves as both a bastion of defense and a symbol of foreboding power. Shrouded in overcast skies and buffeted by desert winds, it is home to Rhime Battenborne, a brooding noble whose sorcery draws from ancient, ominous sources, casting a long shadow over the realm he seeks to unify.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0FF3P6C3X
  • Accessibility ‏ : ‎ Learn more
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ July 29, 2025
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 3.4 MB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 364 pages
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Best Sellers Rank: #3,095,549 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 out of 5 stars (3)

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Scott Tirrell

Scott Tirrell

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Scott Austin Tirrell is known for his epic dark fantasy series Absolution of the Morning Star. He has always been fascinated by the spaces in between—the twilight hours when the world feels a little less certain, the moments when light and darkness blend into something neither, and the quiet truths whisper.

When Scott writes, it’s not just to tell a story but to explore the questions that haunt him. What if the afterlife wasn’t a release but a prison? What if the gods we revere are not saviors but jailers? What does redemption look like when you blur the lines between good and evil beyond recognition?

The messy, uncomfortable truths—the ones that gnaw at you when you’re alone, are what stimulate Scott. He plays with notions that power often comes at a price, that love can be as dangerous as hate, and that the path to salvation is rarely clear. He writes to understand why we sacrifice so much for the promise of light, even when the shadows feel more honest.

For Scott, storytelling is not about answers—it’s about opening doors. It’s about walking into the dark and daring to ask, What if? It’s about characters who wrestle with their demons and worlds where every truth has a cost.

If you’ve ever felt that pull—the sense that there’s more beneath the surface, that the world isn’t as black and white as it seems—then you and Scott just might be kindred spirits.

His upcoming book, Koen: Quills from the Raven’s Nest, a prequel to the Absolution of the Morning Star (AMS) series, is scheduled for publication by Grendel Press in 2025. The AMS series includes Dawn of the Lightbearer, The Mourning Son, Noonday in the North, Destiny of the Daystar, and the forthcoming Dusk of the Demon and Queen of the Knight. The Novice of Thanatos is also available, a first-person memoir set in the same world as Absolution of the Morning Star. This book follows eleven-year-old Mishal, a novice psychopomp in the Order of Thanatos, and is the first in a planned trilogy chronicling his spiritual growth, struggles with moral ambiguity, and the uncovering of dark secrets within the Order.

Scott lives with his wife in the Boston area.

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
3 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

  • Melissa Rischall
    5.0 out of 5 stars Highly recommend
    Reviewed in the United States on August 27, 2025
    Format: Paperback
    It is a beautifully atmospheric dark fantasy that blends gothic romance with political intrigue. Through Evaline’s eyes, the story reveals a world of shadowed halls, subtle power struggles, and the quiet resilience of a heroine finding her voice in a place that would rather silence her. It’s a haunting, elegant read for fans of fantasy with a gothic edge.
    Helpful
     Report
  • Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Gothic and Gripping
    Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2025
    Format: Kindle
    Gothic, gripping, and beautifully written. Evaline’s journey is the true heart of this tale, and it kept me turning pages late into the night.
    Helpful
     Report

Top reviews from other countries

  • Audrey Driscoll
    4.0 out of 5 stars A Castle and Its Duke
    Reviewed in Canada on February 9, 2026
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    This is one of several books set in Lucardia, a fictional realm whose history is written in blood, intrigue, and dark magic. In this one, a girl of sixteen is sent to the weird castle of Eldenspire to marry its Duke, Rhime Battenborne. Evaline did not expect this to happen to her, but it does, and she has to make the best of it. Getting to know Rhime and his ancient home is a demanding process that calls upon Evaline to make choices and do things she could not have imagined.

    This book certainly lives up to the norms of dark fantasy. Descriptions of Eldenspire castle, its chambers, halls, furnishings, and especially its sinister spire, are rich and fulsome. The dark magic that dwells within the castle and Duke Rhime’s secret sorceries are intriguing. As the book progresses, scenes of strategizing and plotting alternate with ones of conflict and bloodshed. Evaline reels from shock and horror to acceptance and resolve. She attends councils of dukes and lords, where she speaks with the authority of a strategist, surprising in one so young and with little experience beyond her childhood home.

    Despite all the description, neither the places nor the people felt real to me. The story arc is more like that of a game than real life. We see the two main characters only in a series of crises, without opportunities to fully show their personalities or qualities that would make them sympathetic. I had no sense of the ordinary people beyond the castle, except for a few scenes of poverty and ugly desperation. The implication is that Rhime’s ambitions for unifying the realm by force would improve everyone’s lives, but that seems like a peripheral effect. The main goal is power at any cost, as the reader is reminded in nearly every chapter. Victories are fleeting and the ending of the book promises more conflict and tragedy to come, to this reader a somewhat wearying effect.
    Report
See more reviews

Report an issue


Does this item contain inappropriate content?
Report
Do you believe that this item violates a copyright?
Report
Does this item contain quality or formatting issues?
Report