Circle Mage Novels & Stories

My boy friend Caleb Ford's childhood sweetheart, Julia Leclair, is losing her hair from chemotherapy. So, he orders me to cut mine off and make her a wig. "Julia's allergic to synthetic wigs. You've been growing your hair for ten years—it's perfect." I refuse, but his friends tie me down. Someone shaves my head to the scalp, buzzing through my thick, glossy hair until nothing's left but a butchered mess. Julia sits in her wheelchair and laughs, saying I look like a toad. Caleb smiles and nods in agreement. He adds with a chuckle, "It's just some hair. Was that really necessary?" But back when I was bullied for having uneven, choppy short hair for six straight years, it was he who stood in front of me. He had his arms spread wide as he shielded me from harm. Now he's the one wielding the blade. One by one, their little circle chimes in. They tell me not to hold a grudge against someone who's sick. Caleb snaps impatiently, "Stop trying to talk sense into her. She can get lost! Did you see that fit she threw over a few strands of hair? It's not like they won't grow back." I turn around and walk away. I never look back. Later, I hear that Caleb begs for my forgiveness by kneeling his way up 9000 steps until his knees are ruined.

Vanessa Brooks was the kind of woman the world bowed to. Old money. Chandeliers. Every circle worshipped her—until Julian Frost decided she was guilty. He had loved her once. Or so she believed. But when murder by jealous rage became the charge, he didn't defend her. He testified. He stood in that courtroom and watched them drag her away in chains, his eyes colder than the steel on her wrists. Three years inside. Concrete walls. Thin blankets. Fists in the dark. They broke three ribs. Split her lip so many times she forgot how to smile. The magazine-cover beauty learned to sleep with her back to the wall, one eye open. When the gates opened, Vanessa walked out with nothing but the clothes on her back and a heart too dead for hatred. She left. She buried the name Julian Frost like a corpse. But Julian wasn't done. The moment he saw her on another man's arm—a ring that wasn't his—something inside him snapped. Cold indifference curdled into obsession. He tore her engagement apart. Dragged her back. Forced a ring onto her finger and built a prison from a marriage certificate. Vanessa endured in silence. No tears. No screams. Just divorce papers, slid across his desk, again and again. The third time, Julian ripped them in half. His voice was ragged—a king reduced to begging. "Divorce? Over my dead body."

On my five-hundred-and-twentieth flight into Chicago, my boyfriend finally came to the airport for me. He held a bouquet of air-flown Blue Moon roses, and the diamond ring inside the velvet box caught the terminal lights. The moment he dropped to one knee, I heard the shocked gasps around us. “Eliana Lowe,” he said, his gray-blue eyes lifted to mine. “Marry me.” My fingers tightened around the handle of my suitcase. I held out my hand, my voice already shaking. "Luca, we--" The ring had barely slid over my finger when Luca laughed. He wasn't looking at me anymore. He was looking over my shoulder at the row of black SUVs idling by the curb. "Told you she'd say yes. Hand over the key to Warehouse Three." Laughter burst from the SUVs. Luca's circle spilled into view: casino managers, dock supervisors, rich kids who lived off the Moretti name, and Vivian Gray at the front in pale fur, laughing hard enough to wipe at the corner of her eye. “No wonder she stayed at your heels for ten years. If I had a pet this obedient, I wouldn’t have the heart to throw it out either.” Luca smiled and patted my head soothingly.“Eliana, it was just a joke. Don't be angry. I’ll make it up to you later.” I looked at the ring on my finger, then at the people laughing behind him. For ten years, I had played along with his games. This time, I didn’t want to anymore.

On the night of her mating ceremony, Aria’s world collapses when her fated mate, the future Alpha, rejects her before the entire pack and chooses her stepsister instead. In a single moment, she loses her mate, her family, and her place in the pack, becoming a public disgrace overnight. Homeless and humiliated, Aria expects nothing but survival. Instead, she crosses paths with Aurelia, the young daughter of Kael Blackwood, the most feared Alpha in the territory and uncle to the man who rejected her. Kael is cold, powerful, and untouchable. A man even Alphas avoid. When Aurelia refuses to let Aria go, Kael reluctantly allows her into his household. But what begins as shelter quickly turns into scandal as rumors spread: why is a rejected Omega living under the protection of the strongest Alpha? As pressure builds from the pack and political enemies begin to circle, Aria is pulled into Kael’s world in ways she never intended. To protect his reputation, and hers, the situation escalates into a political marriage neither of them expected. But living under Kael’s roof changes everything. Aria rises from a discarded Omega into a woman who begins to challenge the very structure of the pack, while Kael finds himself drawn to her in ways he refuses to acknowledge. At the same time, the mate who rejected her begins to realize the weight of his mistake and wants her back. Now Aria is caught between a past that broke her, and a future tied to the most dangerous Alpha in the territory. And this time, fate may not be the only thing deciding her choice.

My Alpha mate's childhood sweetheart was a witch. She told everyone my blood carried a Cursed Bloodline — that bonding with Damon would kill him. On our anniversary, she drew a Curse Circle outside my door, claiming it would suppress my dark energy. At our Mating Ceremony, she disguised herself as a server and swapped our Bonding Tokens for a Curse Rune. Every single time, she'd kneel in front of Damon and cry: "I'm only trying to protect you from the curse. Everything I do is for you!" And every single time, Damon went soft. He said she just cared about him too much. Until the eve of our Marking Ceremony, when she drugged me, put on my Luna ceremonial gown, and crawled into Damon's bed. I woke up just in time and reported her to the Pack Enforcers. Damon went straight to the Enforcers' station to get her out, then turned to me and said coldly: "Serena was just trying to protect me. Do you really have to make such a big deal out of this?" Until I bled out during labor and fell into a coma, and she stood over me with tears in her eyes, telling Damon: "Choose me and let her go — this is the will of the Moon Goddess.." I left this world together with the child still in my belly. Then I opened my eyes again. I was back on the day of the Mating Ceremony, and she was about to slip the Hex Rune into our token box. This time, I didn't hold back. I ripped open the box in front of everyone and slapped the rune onto her forehead: "I think the one who needs cleansing is you!"

"Hey, beautiful." I turned around slowly to see a guy approaching me from the party. "I'm not interested." "But, I am." He cackled. "Well, that's too bad, huh?" I laughed, leaning against the wall as my vision cleared a bit. "Shut up." "And why should she listen to you?" That's when I noticed Tyson leaning against the refrigerator with his arms crossed over his chest. "And who might you be?" The guy turned to face Tyson instead of me. "Her boyfriend?" "No, but I'm the guy who just fucked your mom, and she said I should tell you how much she enjoyed it since your father can't compare." "You're a dead man walking, punk!" The guy charged at Tyson. And next thing I knew, Tyson was pulling the guy up from the floor by his shirt and shoving him towards the exit, effortlessly. I smirked. ☆☆☆☆ Ashley, the daughter of a millionaire, moves to a new city and hopes for a fresh start. With her sharp wit, she often finds herself at the center of school drama, not by choice, but by circumstances. Intent on maintaining a low profile at her new campus, her plan quickly falls apart when she mistakenly parks her bike in a reserved spot. Tyson, the school's notorious bad boy, is not just a troublemaker, but he's the youngest gang leader to be a part of a powerful mafia, feared by many but understood by few. Despite his fearsome reputation in the streets while other leaders might see him as a mere boy, Tyson is fiercely loyal to his inner circle, showing a side of him that few ever see. What will happen when their paths cross? ☆☆☆☆ "𝑫𝒆𝒅𝒊𝒄𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒈𝒊𝒓𝒍𝒔 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒅𝒐𝒆𝒔𝒏'𝒕 𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒓𝒕 𝒂 𝒇𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕, 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒔𝒖𝒓𝒆 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒉𝒐𝒘 𝒕𝒐 𝒇𝒊𝒏𝒊𝒔𝒉 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒎." ☆☆☆☆

In the shadowy underbelly of Chicago, where loyalty is currency and power is everything, 18-year-old Kylie Santos finds herself at the center of a dangerous game she never asked to play. What happens when duty collides with desire? When the price of family loyalty is your own heart? Born into the notorious Santos crime family, Kylie has always known her life would be different. But nothing could have prepared her for the bombshell her father drops one fateful evening. As rival gangs close in, threatening to destroy everything the Santos family has built over generations, Kylie learns that she is to be the linchpin in a desperate plan for survival. "You will marry his oldest son, Lysander," her father declares, his voice as cold and unyielding as steel. In an instant, Kylie's world shatters. She's to wed Lysander Vincenzo, heir to the New York Familia — their longtime enemies turned reluctant allies. can decades of bloodshed and mistrust truly be erased by a single union? Suddenly, Kylie is thrust into a world of high-stakes politics and deadly power plays. Every move she makes could tip the delicate balance between peace and all-out war. As she navigates this treacherous new reality, Kylie must grapple with her own desires and ambitions. Can she sacrifice her dreams for the greater good of her family or find a way to forge her own path amidst the chaos? But Lysander Vincenzo is no mere pawn in this game of chess. Rumored to be as ruthless as he is handsome, he harbors his own secrets and ambitions. As Kylie and Lysander circle each other warily, an unexpected spark ignites between them. Could their arranged union blossom into something real or will the weight of family expectations and old grudges snuff out any chance at true love?

My fiancé, Luca, dragged me along to a party with his crew. We had barely walked through the door before his boys were hounding him to play "Seven Minutes in Heaven." "Angelina, babe, come join us!" Fiona, Luca’s "best friend" from back home, called out to me with a smirk. I shook my head and slipped onto a barstool, my fingers nervously tracing the rim of my glass. I watched them huddle in a circle, drawing cigar bands with names scribbled on them. Luca drew Fiona. They shared a laugh before disappearing into the storage room behind the bar. "Seven minutes! Starting... now!" someone hollered, followed by a chorus of whistles. But seven minutes came and went. The door stayed shut. Ten minutes. Fifteen. Twenty... I finally stood up, my heart hammering against my ribs, ready to see what was going on. Just then, I heard Luca’s friends whispering in a thick Sicilian dialect. "This American guy... her head is greener than a lemon tree in Palermo and she doesn’t even know it." "I bet Luca and Fiona are having the time of their lives in there right now." "Poor Boston girl. Look at her, sitting there like a loyal little dog. Hilarious." I froze. My blood turned to ice, and the air felt too thin to breathe. Suddenly, the storage room door creaked open. Luca walked out, wiping sweat from his brow, followed closely by Fiona, who was busy smoothing out her rumpled shirt. "Whoa, how was it? Seven minutes in heaven live up to the hype?" someone teased. Luca smirked, his eyes glazed with satisfaction. "Better. I didn't want to leave."

I was the real heiress who had just been found and brought home. After I returned to my family, my parents did not favor the fake heiress like the rumors claimed. Instead, they put me first in everything. I quickly integrated into this social circle, and even the fake heiress' childhood friend, Drake Weston, showed interest in me. On the day my father asked me to choose a marriage partner, I was walking toward Drake when pop-up messages suddenly appeared before my eyes. [Don't choose him. He's always loved the fake heiress. He's only getting close to you to seize the family assets in your hands. If you choose him, you're as good as dead. He'd risk his life for the fake heiress, and she's been trying to kill you all along.] I stopped and turned toward the Lockwood family's illegitimate son, Callum Lockwood. Another pop-up message appeared before my eyes. [Choose him. He's kind-hearted and family-oriented, and he's secretly in love with you. You won't go wrong choosing him.] In my previous life, I was misled by the pop-up messages and chose Callum, who seemed harmless. It turned out he was the one who loved the fake heiress. Less than a year after our marriage, they plotted together and killed me. Only after I died did I learn the fake heiress had manipulated all those pop-up messages. She even killed my parents and inherited all my family's assets. This time, I chose Drake without hesitation. The fake heiress and Callum completely lost their composure.

I waited ten years to get married to Emily Stanton. We had applied for a marriage license seven times, and seven times it had been called off. In our circle, we were the golden couple. She had sold her own blood to help cover my hospital bills, and I had stood by her side as she built the Stanton family empire from nothing. On our tenth anniversary, I brought up the idea of finally having a wedding ceremony and making things official again. She just rubbed her temples and tossed her blazer aside. "We'll talk about it later. We've been together this long—why are you still hung up on something like this?" The words I wanted to say got stuck in my throat. Does every great love eventually fade into something ordinary? The sound of running water came from the bathroom. Then her phone buzzed with a notification. Against my better judgment, I picked it up. The contact name on the screen was impossible to miss: Honey. [Baby, when are you coming home? Jamie says she misses Mommy.] A storm of emotions crashed over me. That's when I discovered Emily Stanton had another WhatsApp account. The woman in those posts was nothing like the one I knew. At the top was a wedding photo—the two of them beaming, radiant. Tucked among the roses she'd received yesterday was a brand-new diamond ring, hidden between the petals. The water in the bathroom stopped. I clenched my fists. Then I forwarded the guy's WhatsApp info to my assistant. [Look into him.]