Deepstep and the Soul of Another: Book 18 (Painted Path Series)

Fourteen-year-old Tyler doesn’t care about anyone but himself. He talks loud, mocks weakness, and always has to win—even if someone else pays the price. Feelings are for suckers. Vulnerability is for losers. And empathy? Never even crossed his mind.

But when a freak accident at a riding camp leaves Tyler alone with a quiet, strange Warmblood named Deepstep, everything begins to change. One moment he’s yelling at a stable hand, and the next—he’s not himself anymore. He’s in someone else. Someone weaker. Someone he never would’ve noticed before.

Deepstep has a gift, ancient and mysterious: the power to swap souls. To walk another person’s path—hooves, heartache, and all. And Tyler’s about to take that journey whether he wants to or not.

With every soul he enters, Tyler is stripped of his comfort, his control, and the lies he’s always told himself about strength. He feels the sharp ache of hunger in a girl who’s too proud to ask for help. He endures the silence of a boy everyone laughs at. He weeps with the loss of a mother he never knew someone else had already buried. And slowly, painfully, he begins to see.

Each return to his own body feels heavier. His legs weaker. His voice smaller. But something is growing where his arrogance used to be—a strange flicker of understanding. Of tenderness. Of the terrifying, beautiful ache of empathy.

Through Deepstep’s quiet guidance, Tyler learns that real strength isn’t domination—it’s compassion. And real leadership doesn’t come from being feared, but from standing shoulder to shoulder with those who hurt and heal and hope.

But the final test will demand more than insight. It will require sacrifice. Because one last soul waits—one Tyler swore he’d never care about. And this time, the choice might not be reversible.

Set against a backdrop of horses, hardship, and the raw, redemptive lessons of the soul, Deepstep and the Soul of Another is a powerful addition to the series. For readers young and old, it’s a reminder that the longest journeys sometimes happen inside the heart.

When a boy stops seeing the world as his stage and starts seeing it as a shared story—everything changes.