Is the Darkling really dead in ‘Shadow and Bone?’

Warning: The following article contains spoilers for the season two finale of Shadow and Bone and the Grishaverse novels.

Shadow and Bone‘s second season threw Grishaverse fans for a spin, adapting storylines from Leigh Bardugo’s Siege and Storm, Ruin and Rising, and Crooked Kingdom. This season, Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li) and Mal Oretsev (Archie Renaux) set off in search of two mythical amplifiers, in order to destroy the Shadow Fold dividing Ravka, and put a stop to the Darkling (Ben Barnes).

Over the course of the season, the antagonist grows weaker as a result of using dark magic to create shadow monsters. Despite this condition, the Darkling remains relentless, determined to have Alina join his side to expand the Fold and weaponize it. This leads to a final confrontation during episodes seven and eight of season two, in which Alina ultimately comes out on top. Using Mal’s amplifier powers, she gets rid of the Fold, and later kills the Darkling with the Neshyenyer blade.

For a Grisha that seemed immortal, having been alive for over 400 years, the antagonist went down pretty easily at Alina’s hands. In his final moments, he simply requested that his body be burned, so that nothing is left of him. And that’s exactly what happened, to some viewers’ disappointment. This is a fantasy series, however, which means it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for the character to make a comeback.

Can the Darkling come back from the dead?

Those who wish to see the Darkling on their screen again will be pleased to know that is a very real possibility. In the Grishaverse books, the antagonist is also killed by Alina at the end of Ruin and Rising but doesn’t stay dead forever. Toward the end of King of Scars, a spinoff novel focused on Nikolai Lantsov and Zoya Nazyalensky, the Darkling rises again from the shadow monster inside Nikolai.

As the King of Ravka undergoes a ritual he believes will get rid of the monster, something goes terribly wrong and the Darkling’s spirit claims a new body. As it turns out, the ritual was nothing more than a trick meant to bring the antagonist back to life, and it works almost perfectly. While there’s no saying if Netflix’s Shadow and Bone will take the same route as the books, the show’s season two finale seems to point in that direction, with Nikolai seeing himself as a shadow monster in the mirror.

The first two seasons of Shadow and Bone are available for streaming on Netflix.