An Invitation to the Feast

A young witch is invited to a mysterious feast where powerful beings gather under the stars. To gain forbidden power, she must first outwit the guests who want her soul.

Guests Who Want Her Soul

Every century, the Star Feast convenes in a pocket dimension between worlds — an obsidian table beneath a sky of dying stars, where twelve of the most powerful magical beings in existence gather to trade secrets, artifacts, and souls. Novice witch Morwen is shocked to receive an invitation; the twelfth seat is usually reserved for an archmage or a lich, not a twenty-year-old hedge witch. She learns upon arrival that her invitation is not an honor — it's a loophole. The feast requires twelve seats filled, and the eleventh guest, a demon prince, killed the original twelfth invitee so he could bring a weak replacement he could easily dominate. Morwen is expected to be devoured — literally or metaphorically — by the end of the night.

Outwitting the Powerful

The feast follows ancient rules: no violence at the table, all bargains magically binding, and any guest who leaves before dawn forfeits everything they brought. Morwen's only advantage is that the other guests underestimate her. She begins playing them against each other, making small deals to accumulate enough bargaining power to survive. She trades a childhood memory to a fey queen for the ability to detect lies, then uses that ability to expose the demon prince's debt to another guest. Every deal costs her something personal — memories, emotions, years of her life — and by midnight she's barely recognizable as the naive witch who arrived. The finale arrives when she must face the demon prince directly at the witching hour, not with combat magic but with the most dangerous thing she has left: a single, perfectly timed truth that will shatter an alliance the other guests have maintained for centuries. But telling that truth means revealing her own deepest secret — that she's not entirely human, and never was.

The Price of Starlight

A bottle-episode thriller set entirely at a single dinner table, yet somehow never feels static or repetitive. The web of alliances and betrayals among the twelve guests is impossibly intricate, and Morwen's rapid evolution from victim to player is electrifying to witness. Each guest — the fey queen, the demon prince, the silent lich, the weeping angel — is a fully realized character with their own agenda, and the verbal sparring scenes are more tense than most action sequences. The magic system's emphasis on equivalent exchange (you can trade anything, but nothing is free) creates constant tension over what Morwen will sacrifice next. The final reveal about her heritage recontextualizes the entire story and sets up a sequel that readers are desperate for.

Key Details

  • Category: Fairy Tale Retold
  • Rating: 4.7/5
  • Status: Ongoing
  • Chapters: 36
  • Tags: Witches, Dark Fantasy, Political, Thriller, Magic

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