Shadow Kissed (Magic Side: Wolf Bound Book 4)

In Untamed Fate (book 2), our heroine Savannah Caine finally defeated Ulan Kahanov, the blood sorcerer who’d drained her blood in book 1 and had been haunting her dreams. She discovered that Kahanov had actually been possessed by the ghost of Victor Dragan—a powerful twin-soul who Savy’s aunt had defeated years ago.

Savannah’s victory came at a cost. Kahanov cut her with the Soul Knife, creating a wound that wouldn’t heal, despite her werewolf blood and Jaxson’s magic.

At the beginning of Dark Lies (book 3) Savy found herself struggling to come to terms with being a werewolf as well as the revelation that Jaxson was her fated mate—a fact that he’d hidden from her. Despite her mistrust and resentment, she was about to have much bigger problems on her hands.

Ghosts began appearing with warnings and threats, and on a highway outside of Magic Side, she was attacked by a gang werewolf bikers. She learned that the bikers were hooked on a super-drug that Kahanov had manufactured by refining the blood that he’d stolen from her in book 1, Wolf Marked. The bikers’ supply had run out, and they were hunting her down to make more.

The bikers brazenly attacked her outside of Eclipse, forcing Savy and Jax to take the offensive. They tracked the bikers to a bar and, after a rumble, interrogated them. To their shock, they learned that the ghost of Victor Dragan had returned and taken possession of the leader of the motorcycle club, turning it into a cult. His goal was to bring back the Dark Wolf God, a sinister and dangerous deity from werewolf lore intent on wiping humanity off the map. Savy also learned of a werewolf prophecy that claimed that a twin-soul (like Dragan and Savannah) would bring back the Dark God, and steal the souls of the pack.

Savy went to her aunt for help, but discovered that Laurel and her parents were responsible for originally binding her wolf when she was a child. Driven by rage and betrayal, Savy lost control of her magic and attacked her aunt. In horror at what she’d just done, she fled.

With the clock ticking on the Dark God’s return, Savy and Jax recruited a team of Order agents and converged on Pere Cheney cemetery to disrupt the cultist’s ritual. They succeeded, stopping Dragan from bringing back the Dark God. Needing a new host, Dragan attempted to possess Savy, but she fought him off. Unfortunately, he escaped by possessing someone else.

That left Savy and Jax with the question: how do you trap a ghost? Savy made a bargain with the ghost-witch that haunted Pere Cheney to find out, and learned they needed Dragan’s bones to trap him and destroy him for good. Unfortunately, the only bone remaining was in the possession of a notorious vampire who’d cut off Dragan’s finger.

With the help of Damian Malek and Neve Cross, they visited the vampire’s mansion in San Miguel de Allende. Negotiations broke down when he got a whiff of Savy’s blood and attacked. They killed him, and escaped with the finger by the skin of their teeth.

While our heroine and hero were in Mexico, Dragan possessed a new host and infiltrated Bentham prison, one of the most secure locations in the magical world. He took it over during a riot and locked the place down so that no one could get in and disrupt his ritual.

Savy and Jax convinced the Order’s archmages to sneak them in through a secret access tunnel beneath Lake Michigan. They found the prison overrun by possessed cultists and Dragan on the verge of completing the ritual to summon the Dark God. The only step remaining was the bloody sacrifice of a twin-soul: Savannah.

They battled Dragan on the roof of the prison and came within an inch of losing their lives, but at the last second, Savy trapped him using a talisman that they’d made from his bones. Having saved the prison and everyone inside from certain death, Savy used her Aunt’s Orb of Destruction to annihilate Dragan once and for all.

Upon leaving her aunt’s house, the Dark God spoke in her head: Your sacrifice is accepted, little wolf. Together, we will bring darkness upon the world.

Overcome with horror, Savy realized that she was the twin-soul prophesied to free the Dark God, not Dragan. If the rest of the prophecy came true, she was destined to steal the souls of the pack.

She fled Magic Side to protect the pack, and set her mind to finding a way to fight the Dark God, the prophecy, and her fate…

And that is where our story begins.