The man sighed, looked disappointed.
“No, I’m afraid I can’t,” he said. “I have a conference I need to attend.”
“I don’t think we’ll get much more today.”
“It’s quite all right,” the man said. “You gentlemen can go ahead. I may just wait for another few minutes to see if I can’t coax the patient back into talking.”
“It’s against procedure to leave a doctor alone with this particular patient. We made that mistake early on—Dr. Miller here was nearly critically injured.”
“Gentlemen, the patient is restrained,” the man replied. “I’ll be fine. I don’t intend to stay very long in any case.”
The two doctors conferred in low voices. For a minute, the man was certain he would be denied, wondered what his plan would be then. Instead, Dr. Miller nodded in his direction. The two doctors looked briefly at the patient, then left the room.
The man stared at the patient.
“Quinn?” he asked. “Can you hear me?”
The patient didn’t look up.
“Quinn?” the man asked again. “We need to talk.”
The patient was staring at a spot on the table.
“Kate,” the man said finally. “Kate, you need to look at me.”
The patient stirred at that. The man saw eyes blinking, signs of life returning.
“Kate?” the man said. “Kate, look at me!”
“I’m not Kate,” the patient said, looking up. “My name is Quinn O’Brion.”
“I know it seems that way,” the man said. “Believe me, I know what this is like. But Quinn’s dead, Kate. Quinn’s been dead for three months.”
“No,” the patient said. “No.”
“Yes, Kate,” the man replied patiently. “He died on the battlefield. You can still hear him in your head. It’s like that at first. I know. I remember. I spent the first few years seeing her in the mirror every day, staring back at me where my reflection should have been. You have his memories, his personality, still inside of you. Sometimes it’s overwhelming.”
“Your reflection?” the patient asked, seeming more alert and engaged. “Who are you?”
“Who do I look like, Kate?” the man asked.
“You seem… familiar,” the patient said. Then her eyes widened, a gasp escaped her lips. She suddenly pushed forward, straining against her restraints.
“You bastard,” she said. “You fucking bastard. You killed me.”
“No,” the man replied. “I killed Quinn. You’re still alive.”
The comment seemed to shake the patient from her slumber. She blinked rapidly. For a minute, her eyes were wild, unfocused. Then they settled on the man in front of her.
Her lips curled back and her expression became almost savage. But for the first time in months, she was fully awake.
“Kieran,” she said and it came out like a hiss. “I’ll kill you, I swear it. My powers will come back one day. Then I’ll hunt you down.”
The man seemed unbothered by her reaction.
“I don’t doubt it, Kate,” Kieran said. “But you need to understand something first.”
“What could you possibly say to me?”
“I said I know what it’s like to lose your other half,” Kieran said. “My name—my real name—is Charles Kieran Collins. I was known as C.K. I was one half of the Prince of Sanheim 30 years ago. I was your predecessor.”
“But you said…”
“I lied, Kate,” Kieran said. “Remember I said that only one Prince of Sanheim had ever surrendered to another? I was that Prince.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They killed her, Kate,” Kieran said. “We were going to fight. But Grace found out about Elyssa and me and stormed out. It was a trap. Sawyer was waiting for her. He murdered her in cold blood. I was hell-bent on revenge—didn’t care that I would die. But it was already Halloween and Sanheim appeared. He offered me a deal. He offered me a chance to get Grace back.”
“You served them? You served the ones who killed Grace?”
“Yes,” Kieran said. “I did. Because I thought that if I helped defeat them, Sanheim would give Grace back to me.”
Kate started laughing. It was a bitter, broken sound.
“You absolute fool,” she said. “Why would you trust a single thing that man said?”
Kieran shook his head.
“For a long time, I convinced myself he would honor our agreement,” he said. “Even when I killed Quinn, I thought he might actually do it. But in my heart, I knew better.”
“But you killed Quinn anyway!” Kate said.
She pushed against the restraints again.
“Yes,” Kieran replied. “But I was making other plans as well.”
“I don’t care,” Kate said. “Nothing you say matters anymore. You killed Quinn. When I’m out of here, I will feast on your heart.”
“Listen to me very closely,” Kieran said.
“I’m going to kill you, Kieran,” Kate replied. “If I have to kill everyone in this facility on my way out, I will kill you.”
“Kate?”
“I swear it,” she said.
“Sanheim thinks this is over,” Kieran said. “He thinks he beat me—betrayed me and left me to die at your hands.”
“He’s right,” Kate said.
“No, he’s not,” Kieran replied. “Don’t you see? It’s the same cycle playing out over and over. Sawyer loses Anne and will do anything for his revenge. I lose Grace, and betray you and Sawyer to get her back. You lose Quinn and kill me. We have to break the cycle, Kate. It’s the only way.”
“I don’t care about any of that,” Kate said.
“But you should. Because I know something Sanheim doesn’t.”
“What?” Kate said, and it came out as a snarl. “What could you possibly know?”
“You are the last, Kate,” Kieran said. “I didn’t know what it meant before, but now I do. It changes everything. I know where Quinn is. I know how to get him back.”
THE END
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Band of Demons is the second book in a trilogy called The Sanheim Chronicles. The third book, Give the Devil His Due, was published on Oct. 1, 2013, for Kindle and Nook. To be notified of future publications, please join Rob’s e-mail newsletter by clicking here. For more regular updates, please like his official Facebook page here.
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Acknowledgements
Warning: If, for some reason, you are reading the acknowledgements without finishing the book first, you might want to turn back now. Major spoilers are ahead. If you’ve already finished Band of Demons, you’re safe to proceed.
Last winter, I was honored to be invited to speak to a book club in Leesburg about my first novel, A Soul to Steal. I was a little nervous since I had never talked to a whole group about my book before, much less a crowd who had actually read it. For me at least, it was a wonderful discussion. People asked great questions about virtually everything in the book. It was one of the first times I was really conscious of the fact that what had been in my head, now existed in other people’s minds as well.
At some point, there was a discussion about killing off characters, including a reference to Janus, Quinn’s best friend who meets a rather ghastly (but also somewhat heroic) end in the first novel. Someone asked if the trilogy would end happily.
Because I am ultra-secretive about all plot points, I dodged the question by saying that I hoped it would be a “satisfying” conclusion, which can mean any number of things. The woman who asked it laughed and said something like: “Well, at least we know if you have a trilogy, you won’t kill off Quinn or Kate in Book #2.” Others laughed and nodded.
I smiled and said nothing. I was already two-thirds through writing Band of Demons and I knew full well what was going to happen. Quinn O’Brion, who many saw as the primary protagonist, was going to die.
Until that
moment, though, I had never once stopped to consider how readers might feel about it. When I conceive of a book, I see the plot and characters as mine to do with as I please. During the writing process, that often changes as characters themselves inevitably surprise me by taking some unanticipated action.
But I had never worried about what readers thought before. After all, when I wrote A Soul to Steal, there weren’t any readers to worry about. It wasn’t until I was sitting in the book club that I realized the situation had changed.
A couple months later, I had another reminder that I wasn’t just writing for myself. A reader on Goodreads posted this review of A Soul to Steal: “BLACKWELL, I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU FOR JANUS. NEVER.” The reviewer (whom I contacted because I was impressed with the passion of her sentiment) later told me she had hurled her Kindle across the room when Janus died.
By then, Band of Demons was in its second or thrift draft and Quinn’s destiny was fixed. If people were mad at me for killing Janus, what were they going to say about Quinn? I’m still waiting for an answer to that question and I will be honest—I’m anxious about it.
If it helps, killing Quinn was never easy. My wife can attest that I cried when I wrote the scene where he died. It’s tough to kill characters you care about, and I care for almost all of them, even the “bad” ones. But stories are cruel things, and sometimes circumstances and plot demand that a character must be sacrificed. Not because the author wants to do it, but because that’s how the story goes.
I honestly don’t feel like I make up stories—I discover them. They twist, turn and morph as I write, but they are not entirely mine to change at my whim. Quinn died because he was supposed to die—he had to. There’s no other way to say it.
For any of you who are upset about that, I can only offer you this: there is more to this tale. And while I would not ask you to trust me, I would ask that you trust the story. Will it be a happy ending? I don’t know about that, but I think it will be a satisfying one.
I would like to say thank you to all the readers of The Sanheim Chronicles. Over the past year, I’ve heard from many of you on my Facebook page, Goodreads, Twitter and Amazon. You’ve asked questions, expressed support and written some truly generous and thoughtful reviews. It is no exaggeration to say it has kept me going at times when I’ve despaired of this whole endeavor.
Inevitably, when I was at a low point, a review would pop up or I’d get a posting on the Facebook page that helped restore my faith that this book was reaching its intended audience. It’s been quite a ride since I published A Soul to Steal, but your enthusiasm for the story and the characters have inspired me to keep going. This book simply wouldn’t be here without you.
Likewise, I owe an enormous debt to my wife and family. When I published A Soul to Steal, I truly didn’t know what I was getting into. It has, in essence, turned into a second full-time job, one that has at times made me a distracted husband and father. I am enormously grateful for my wife’s unflagging support during this time. She has been on this roller coaster with me the whole way and never once wondered whether it was all worth it. She has always believed in me, and that has made all the difference.
If that were her only contribution to this novel, that would be more than enough. But in addition, as she did on the first book, Maia served as the editor for Band of Demons. In my 15 years as a journalist, I’ve worked with a lot of editors in a professional capacity. Maia is one of the best. She went through this novel chapter by chapter, line by line. She looked for plot holes, wording problems, character inconsistencies, you name it. She worked tirelessly over a period of months at improving this novel and it is much, much better as a result. She should be working for a New York publishing house.
I want to thank a few others. Brian Gill, one of my oldest and closest friends, has been one of The Sanheim Chronicles’ greatest champions. I wish I could hire him as my marketing director. He helped A Soul to Steal secure its only celebrity endorsement and has repeatedly talked up the novel in the classes he teaches. He enthusiastically tracks the book’s progress online, including sales rankings and reviews. Sometimes he was the first to tell me when a new review was online. He also provided detailed—and incredibly helpful—feedback on the beta draft of Band of Demons. I have been deeply grateful for his ongoing support.
The others in my beta reading team were also enormously helpful: Tristan Poje, David Miller, Jenny Roahen, Erik Brandt, James Collins and Dan Gasink. Their assistance was invaluable in catching major and minor errors or pointing out parts that might benefit from added explanation. I really appreciate their time and attention to detail.
Additionally, I want to thank my cover artist, Travis Pennington, who once again did a terrific job. Travis worked up more than a dozen possible covers for Band of Demons, so of course I picked the very first one he did.
Last but not least, I want to thank Evelyn Duffy, my copyeditor. Evelyn agreed to help me out toward the end of the process and quickly and efficiently stamped out the remaining typos, repetitive word choices and other issues that can plague a book this long. She was a pleasure to work with and I recommend her highly to other authors looking for editing assistance.
I hope all of you have enjoyed this novel, and I look forward to finishing the trilogy in 2013.
All the best,
Rob Blackwell
September 2012
Band of Demons (The Sanheim Chronicles Book 2) Page 38
