9 details to remember about 'Shadow & Bone' before watching season 2

"Shadow and Bone" is based on the book trilogy of the same name by Leigh Bardugo.

It's set in a fantasy world where monsters and wizards exist. The world is split into six main countries: Ravka, Kerch, Fjerda, Shu Han, Novyi Zem, and the Wandering Isle.

However, there is a giant mass of darkness in the middle of Ravka, filled with monsters called the Volcra, which divides East and West Ravka. It was created hundreds of years ago by a Grisha, the name for wizards in this world, who has been mythologized as the Black Heretic. The Black Heretic was a special type of wizard who could summon shadows and darkness.

It is prophesied that only the sun summoner, who can summon light, can destroy the darkness called the Shadow Fold. This leads us to the present day where Fjerdans hunt Grisha, Ravkans force Grisha to fight in their second army, and the sun summoner is finally revealed as Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li).

In season two of the Netflix series, Alina is still on her mission to destroy the Fold.

Alina is introduced as a half-Shu, half-Ravkan orphan from the Ravkan village Keramzin, who grew up to be a cartographer in her country's army.

In the first episode, she and her childhood best friend Malyen Orestev (Archie Renaux), another orphan and great tracker, are sent through the Shadow Fold to test a new ship that could help East Ravka link to West Ravka.

However, their ship is attacked by the Volcra and Alina discovers she has the ability to summon light by saving the crew.

Alina is then taken in by the Grisha and separated from Mal. While Mal is sent on a mission to discover a magical beast called the Stag, which could help Alina destroy the Fold, Alina must learn the ways of the Grisha at their stronghold called the Little Palace.

After not hearing from Mal, Alina falls for General Aleksander Kirigan (Ben Barnes), the leader of the Grisha army and a shadow summoner himself.

In episode five, Alina is told by Kirigan's mother Baghra (Zoë Wanamaker) that the general is actually the Black Heretic who created the Fold.

Alina flees the Little Palace just as Mal returns with news of the Stag's location. The pair reunite and try to find the Stag themselves to stop Kirigan and vanquish the Fold.

Episode seven takes us back hundreds of years, before the creation of the Fold.

At the time, Kirigan was known as Aleksander Morozova, the grandson of the first recorded Grisha, Morozova, who is also known as the Bonesmith. The Morozovas were the only family able to shadow summon and, in fact, Kirigan's grandfather created creatures, such as the Stag, as amplifiers for all Grisha out of his own bones.

Aleksander became a fierce warrior for Ravka. However, after defeating the king's enemies, the king sent his army to kill Aleksander and other Grisha after seeing the threat they could be. Aleksander's lover Luda (Lucy Griffiths) is killed by the king's soldiers.

As revenge, and despite being warned by his mother, Aleksander tried to use forbidden magic, called merzost, to create an army of his own to defend the Grisha.

However, Aleksander lost control and thus created the Fold and the Volcra.

The Morozova family are immortal because they are summoners rather than normal Grisha, and so Aleksander has changed his name over the years but continued to defend the Grisha and make them an important part of Ravka so that they won't be hunted.

Aleksander has been lying in wait for the sun summoner to appear and will stop at nothing to use both their powers to scare the world into accepting the Grisha.

Before getting to the end of season one, there is a subplot to explain based on Bardugo's other Grishaverse books.

In season one, we also follow a band of thieves from Kerch on a near-impossible mission to cross the Fold, kidnap the rumored sun summoner, and bring her back to Kerch's capital city, Ketterdam.

The thieves, known as the Crows, are made up of three people. Kaz Brekker (Freddy Carter) is their lock-picking criminal genius leader. He is calculating and cruel, and harbors a grudge against the leader of the Ketterdam criminal underworld, Pekka Rollins (Dean Lennox Kelly).

Inej Ghafa (Anita Suman) is a Suli traveler who was kidnapped from her family and enslaved in Ketterdam. While she works as Kaz's spy, the criminal mastermind is paying off her indenture, a slave contract, so that she can be free. In episode two, Kaz hands over the lease to his club, the Crow Club, as collateral to Inej's former master Tante Heleen (Deirdre Mullins) in order to take the spy on the mission.

Finally, there's Zemeni sharpshooter Jesper Fahey (Kit Young), who has a gambling addiction.

The Crows are hired by a wealthy merchant called Dreesen (Sean Gilder) to kidnap Alina for a million Kruge (the currency in Kerch).

Working with a smuggler called the Conductor, they travel through the Fold and attempt to kidnap Alina, but Alina gets away from them and they have to fight a group of Grisha hunting them.

In the finale, they attempt to return to Ketterdam after the shameful failure. However, it is unclear what is waiting for them since Tante, Dreesen, and Pekka will all be angry with their failure.

This brings us back to the main story.

General Kirigan and his Grisha soldiers catch up to Alina and Mal just as they reach the Stag and kill the beast. Kirigan then manages to find a way to control Alina using the Stag's antlers.

Kirigan charters a ship into the Fold with Alina and a few officials from different countries under the premise that they will witness the sun summoner destroy the Fold. But he then reveals his true plan: expanding the Fold to attack West Ravka, whose people have been fighting for its independence from the rest of Ravka.

Unfortunately for Kirigan, Mal and the Crows are stowed away on the ship and fight the Grisha to stop their plan.

Zoya Nazyalenksy (Sujaya Dasgupta), one of the Grisha on the ship and a former lover of Kirigan (and rival of Alina), switches sides to help the Crows.

Alina manages to regain control of her powers from Kirigan in the middle of the chaos, and the fight eventually ends with a Volcra taking Kirigan away and seemingly killing him.

However, in the final scene of season one, Kirigan is seen walking out of the Fold, followed by monsters made out of the same shadow as the Fold and they appear to be under his control.

These could be Nichevo'ya beasts described in the "Shadow and Bones" books. In the books, they are created using merzost magic and can reform after attacks from swords and guns.

After the battle, the Crows, Zoya, Mal, and Alina go their separate ways after leaving the Fold.

Alina and Mal are searching in other countries to find other amplifiers to help Alina destroy the Fold. It is worth noting that many people see Alina as a saint since she was prophesied, meaning it may be hard to travel the world without being recognized.

Zoya heads to find her family who were in West Ravka before Kirigan's attack.

Finally, the Crows return to Ketterdam, with royal jewels given to them by Alina to make sure they don't reveal where she went.

The third subplot revolves around a Grisha called Nina Zenik (Danielle Galligan) and a Fjerdan Drüskelle, which is a sort of Grisha hunter, called Matthias Helvar (Calahan Skogman).

In episode three, the Crows were meant to meet Nina, who would help them enter the palace to kidnap Alina.

However, Nina is captured by a group of Fjerdan Drüskelle before she could meet up with them. They take her on board their ship to head north to the Ice Court in Fjerda, where Nina and other Grisha will be tried for their crimes of being a Grisha.

On the ship, she meets Matthias and the two butt heads. However, when their ship crashes in the storm, they are forced to work together to swim to shore and stay alive.

Nina and Matthias eventually fall for each other and decide to stay together even when they return to civilization.

However, the entire time Nina has been keeping the secret that she is a spy for the Ravkan army. When her comrades come to rescue her and execute Matthias, she lies about him being a slaver so that he is arrested and sent to Kerch, where he will be safe from the Grisha army.

At the end of the season, Nina is seen boarding a boat to Ketterdam with the Crows hoping to free Matthias.

The Grisha come from all parts of the world but mainly fall into three main groups: Corporalki, Etherealki, and Materialki.

Corporalki can manipulate living things by healing them (Healers), changing people's appearance (Tailors), or damaging internal organs (Heartrenders).

The Etherealki manipulate the elements of air (Squallers), water and ice (Tidemakers), and fire (Infernis). The sun and shadow summoners are also in this group.

Finally, the Materialki manipulate chemicals (Alkemis), or solid objects on a molecular level (Durasts).

In Ravka, the Grisha are fitted with a bulletproof garment called a Kefta according to their ability: blue for Etherealki, black for Kirigan, red for Corporalki, and purple for Materialki.

While at the Little Palace earlier in the season, Alina befriended a Tailor called Genya Safin (Daisy Head), who claims she was gifted to the Queen (Georgia Reece) by Kirigan when she was a child.

In episode five, Genya implies that King Pyotr (David Verrey) sexually abuses her. She then reveals to Alina in episode seven that she has secretly been working for Kirigan the entire time and may have used her access to poison the king and destabilize the Ravkan government.

After Kirigan's attack on West Ravka and the implied attack on the king, it is likely that human and Grisha relations are strained more than ever in Ravka.