Promises to Keep
DEN OF SHADOWS
In the Forests of the Night
Demon in My View
Shattered Mirror
Midnight Predator
Persistence of Memory
Token of Darkness
All Just Glass
Poison Tree
THE KIESHA’RA
Hawksong
Snakecharm
Falcondance
Wolfcry
Wyvernhail
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the
product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual
persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2013 by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes
Jacket art copyright © 2013 by Ericka O’Rourke
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s
Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random
House, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
eISBN: 978-0-375-98872-1
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v3.1
Promises to Keep
is dedicated to the eleventh hour and all the people who help us through it. This
novel owes its eleventh-hour salvation to Bri, Mason, and Devon, who had faith and
patience when mine was long gone. Bri encouraged me to dive for a story idea that
has scared me for the last decade; Mason and Devon helped me polish that concept,
tirelessly diving into the characters, mythology, and storyline again and again until
it became the book you now hold
.
Two other groups deserve a shout-out: Veterans of the long-abandoned NRPG may find
something familiar in these pages … and will probably laugh a lot when they recognize
it. The idea formed in those crazy days never could have survived without the near
madness that is National Novel Writing Month, so I must also tip my hat to the Office
of Letters and Light once again
.
Next, I also owe huge thanks to the awesome people at Eastern Mountain Sports, who
were willing to answer my increasingly bizarre questions about winter backpacking
(as soon as I assured them that I did not intend to embark on this poorly planned
adventure myself). Any inaccuracies or blatant mistakes should be blamed on magic,
not on them
.
Finally, it has been too long since I have thanked you, my readers. You ask me all
the time where I get my inspiration. The answer is always “You.” Thank you
.
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
—Robert Frost,
“Stopping by Woods
on a Snowy Evening”
M
IDNIGHT
S
EPTEMBER
22, 1804
W
HEN SHE FIRST
woke, Brina thought the stench and noise that greeted her were an extension of her
nightmares. The stink of smoke and scalded flesh accompanied wails of pain and fear
that echoed through Midnight’s stone halls.
She had spent the last three days with little rest and less sustenance as she had
struggled to put the final touches on a series of paintings illustrating the afterlife.
Though her cohorts had always insisted that vampires couldn’t
have
nightmares, couldn’t have dreams at all, for a century and a half she had dreamt
almost every time she had closed her eyes. The diurnal terrors inspired by the Mayan
Xibalba had been particularly gruesome.
Another reason she didn’t sleep often.
Awake now, she stumbled out of bed. Her body was heavy and her skin raw, a result
of too many hours under midday sunlight. Her kind was normally compelled to sleep
when the sun was high, but Brina needed the light for her art.
Reality further intruded as she tripped over Caleb, a young boy she had recently taken
in, who was huddled against the side of her bed. He must have smelled the smoke, heard
the screams.
Despite his youth, Caleb didn’t cry or call out; he had been raised not to. But Brina
could see him tremble and could smell his sweat in the rising heat. His heart pounded
and his lungs strained against the smoke seeping under the room’s only door.
In this building, the heart of an empire built by vampires, there were no windows.
Brina could have willed herself away in an instant using vampiric magic, but she was
not strong enough to bring Caleb with her.
She pulled the door open. Fire, flickering with the pulse of vicious magic, gnawed
at the stone walls. The reek of burned flesh gave testimony to how many humans and
shapeshifters, some slaves and some willing employees, had been caught trying to flee
the pyre.
No escape, not for anyone mortal.
“Come here, boy,” she commanded, retreating to the farthest corner of the room.
The boy came to her without hesitation, his wide eyes watering from the smoke but
otherwise revealing a placid soul. She snapped his neck before the sweet, trusting
look could leave his face.
There. That’s done
.
She willed herself to her home, where windows let in the sun and—
The stench of death greeted her as she appeared in her own parlor, making her gag.
The blood was fresh, but marked by the smell of decay. The instant a body stopped
functioning, it began to rot; it took only minutes for this to be detectable to vampiric
senses.
The corpses of slaves littered her floors, their eyes wide and their throats slit.
They had not died slowly, but neither had their deaths been especially swift. Whoever
had done the deed had been efficient, not merciful. Who?
Why?
“Brina!”
She turned to find her brother reaching for her. His hands and face were slicked with
blood and ash. “I couldn’t get to you,” Daryl choked out as he pulled her into a tight
embrace. “I tried to get inside, but every entrance was blocked. Are you hurt?”
She shook her head. “My greenhouse—”
“Gone.”
“My paintings?”
“I’m sorry.”
“My boy is dead.”
“Probably for the best.” He pulled her into the next room, where the only evidence
of the slaughter was a single crimson handprint on the doorframe.
Meanwhile …
Sara Vida had a clear shot.
The Mistress of Midnight, a vampire known as Jeshickah, was undeniably the most evil
creature to ever walk the face of the earth. Her empire ruthlessly claimed dominion
over vampires, shapeshifters, humans, and witches—though the witches, Sara’s kin,
were almost an afterthought.
Sara was standing only a few yards from the fiend. The witch gripped a silver knife,
imbued with the power of generations of magic-wielding hunters. And Jeshickah was
distracted, dazed, staring at the building as it burned to ash, the building that
had been the heart of her empire. It would be so easy to sneak up on her and end her
unlife.
Sara crept closer, closer, and then paused as the mercenary’s words came to mind.
Jeshickah is protected by powers too great for us to fight
, the mercenary had warned when Sara had objected to the plan. Why were they destroying
property and not killing the fiends who ran this monstrosity?
If you kill her, her allies will come for you. You will not be able to beat them.
They will slaughter you, and your children, and your entire line. They will wipe the
witches from the face of this earth
.
Could it be true? Midnight had never systematically hunted witches, but it had terrorized
Sara’s kind nevertheless. By killing Jeshickah, would Sara save her people or ensure
their extinction?
Jeshickah tensed, at last sensing the danger.
Too late
.