The Elementals · Book One
Prodigal Son
The chains were forged to last forever.
He was born to break them.
The Story
One Thousand Years of Order About to End
In the age before memory, the Elemental Lords shaped the world through their elemental essence — fire, water, earth, air, and ether. Their power was absolute. Their priests served at their pleasure. Until the day those same priests turned against their gods, binding the Elemental Lords in an act of collective treachery known as the Great Working.
The Lords were bound. The world endured. And magic — the birthright of all living things — became the privilege of the noble class, passed through bloodlines descended from the priests who carried out the betrayal.
For a thousand years, this has been the natural order. Commoners are born with little or no power, and die in poverty or servitude to the nobility. The nobles wage their endless petty wars over elemental territory. And the world slowly forgets that it was ever any different.
Then three siblings lose their parents to one of those wars. And the eldest, Drandal Widdon, through sacrifice and rage begins to change the world.
The Protagonist
Drandal Widdon
Emergents — commoners whose elemental gifts break free of the Great Working — are rare. They appear only through great strife or conflict, manifesting a single element with raw, untrained power. They are feared, hunted, and almost always destroyed before they can overturn the delicate balance of noble power.
Drandal Widdon is not like other Emergents.
When his gifts break free, he manifests not one element — but all five. He is what the nobility has feared for a millennium: the child spoken of in the oldest prophecy, the Prodigal Son who was promised when the Great Working was first completed. The one who would return what was stolen.
But prophecy is not a plan. And being chosen is not the same as being ready.
"Five elements. Not one. Not two. All five, burning through him like he was built to hold them — or like the world had been waiting for someone who could."
The World
The Elementals Universe
The Great Working
The ritual that bound the Elemental Lords and locked magic behind noble bloodlines. The single most consequential act in recorded history — and the wound the world has never healed from.
The Elemental Nobles
Descendants of the original priests, each noble house controls one element. Their wars are small, constant, and deadly to the commoners who live between their territories.
The Emergents
Commoners whose elemental gifts break through the suppression of the Great Working. Rare, feared, and hunted. Usually manifesting a single element. Never all five. Never before.
The Bound Lords
Five elemental gods, imprisoned for a thousand years by the priests who once served them. Their power still shapes the world. Their will still bends toward freedom.
Project Status
Currently in Development
Prodigal Son is Chris Bailey-Smith's debut novel, currently being written with the intention of pitching to literary agents. Updates on progress, world-building notes, and excerpts will be shared here as the manuscript develops.
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