Magic Slays

Author Essay

Every one of us has read fairy tales. Most of them follow the same pattern: a hero or heroine face a great enemy and many challenges. They fight against overwhelming odds and eventually they prevail. They marry a prince or a princess and live Happily Ever After. No sequels—the story is complete and it’s over the moment the hero kisses the princess against the backdrop of the setting sun. It’s a great narrative pattern and it endured through thousands of years. That’s why Magic Slays is a kind of book most authors hope they will never have to write. It’s the story that takes place after the sun has set and a new collection of monsters besieges the happy couple’s castle. When you look at the rest of the series, the calm and sweet Happily Ever After doesn’t really makes sense. Kate, who has been a loner all of her life and avoided responsibility for other people, suddenly finds herself responsible for hundreds of shapeshifters within the Pack. And when they say “responsible”, they mean it: they expect her to manage their troubled offspring, they expect her to sit in judgment and sort out their squabbles, and when danger arises, they expect her to put herself between them and that danger. Stepping into the path of a threat for the sake of other people is nothing new to Kate. However, this time the enemy isn’t a single individual, but many. They are well organized, ruthless and fanatic in pursuit of their goal. And they threaten not just one or two people but literally everyone Kate knows. How do you guard thousands of potential targets against an enemy who could strike anywhere at any time? It doesn’t help that she isn’t universally loved within the Pack. Technically her position as the Beast Lord’s mate comes with great power. Practically, she faces opposition. She loves Curran, but he isn’t the easiest man to live with either. He is stubborn and overly protective, and mind-numbingly difficult when he wants to be. And just when she thinks she has things in hand, her past returns once again and threatens to shatter her from the inside out. On other hand, Curran, who never had to share power before, is faced with the reality: Kate is his mate and he must share. From the moment Mahon had found him, Mahon’s intention had always been to hammer Curran into the ultimate alpha, a man who could subdue and keep control of the violent unpredictable leaders of the shapeshifter clans. Mahon succeeded. Curran is a skilled ruler: he manipulates, manages, rewards, encourages, and threatens the shapeshifters under his command to ensure peace within the Pack. None of his methods work with Kate. She reacts badly to any attempt at manipulation. She refuses commands. And occasionally she laughs at him. So Curran must learn how to request rather than order, and that doesn’t come naturally to the man who’d been a near absolute ruler for the better part of his life. Magic Slays is a volatile book. It’s a boiling pot of emotions and danger, tragedy and comedy, defeat and victory. It’s a story of love and devotion above all else, but it’s also a story of friendship and hate, where failure carries the ultimate price tag. We won’t promise you smooth sailing, but we ask you to trust us. When it comes to our books, that one, most important adage of fairy tales always stays true: we will bring our characters safely to port. Magic Slays is a Happily Ever After in progress, wrought with danger, and perils, and some laughs. We hope you’ll give it a try. Come fight the monsters with us. You won’t regret it.