It’s not quite clear why people who know she’s a trained assassin insist on engaging her in hand-to-hand combat. Sirscha is only feeling her way with magic but she’s an expert duellist and general sneaky person. I quite like the Charlie Bowater cover art. Or perhaps she’s simply an unwanted complication to politics as usual, a complication that should be eliminated at the first opportunity. She may therefore be able to control the Dead Wood, a cursed forest that forms the border between kingdoms, before it grows entirely out of control. Sirscha may be the first soulguide in living memory. The well-born Saengo is somewhat taken aback as the implications of her new role sink in. The two are entangled: shamans need living familiars to work magic, while familiars must remain near their shaman to remain healthy. Sirscha unwittingly transformed her friend into a familiar, the embodiment of Sirscha’s magic. It’s not clear that his interest in Sirscha is benign.

He is centuries old and commands little understood magic, Ronin once defeated the Soulless (a legendary villain). Sirscha is saved from prison or execution by a timely summons from Ronin, the Spider King of Thiy. Too bad that the awakening of shamanic powers is always accompanied by some minor but obvious physical transformation. The catch is that Evewyn’s queen takes a dim view of shamans. What she is will doubtless be revealed in the rest of this series.

Reanimating the dead (to life, not as a zombie) isn’t one of the usual shamanic abilities, but then Sirscha isn’t your usual shaman. The shamanic attack wakened capabilities neither she nor her mentor had ever suspected. What happens next is unexpected and quite disquieting. She is dispatched on an errand by Kendara Saengo accompanies her.

While there, she makes a friend, fellow soldier Saengo.

Part of her training has consisted of service in the army. She apprentices herself to Kendara the Shadow, master spy/assassin for the kingdom of Evewyn. Lee’s Shamanborn series.įoundling Sirscha Ashwyn seems destined to spend an unremarkable life as servant to her betters. 2020’s Forest of Souls is the first volume in Lori M.

Forest of souls lori m lee