Reap & Sow

In the canal-laced city of Blackbridge, the oldest in the nation of Wesland, twenty-year-old Eda Shaw runs Shaws' Antiques & Curiosities alongside her older brothers, Ben and Lawrie. Hidden in their cellar is a Gateway, an obsidian mirror that opens a portal to Infernus, a demon realm. The mirror belongs to a demon the Shaws call Mr. Night, who uses it to forge Pacts: blood-signed contracts in which mortals trade years of their lifespan for a fulfilled wish. The Shaws owe Mr. Night fifty stolen years each autumn harvest, a debt inherited from their father, Oswin. After his wife Emmeline died giving birth to Eda, Oswin bargained with Mr. Night to resurrect her. The price was one thousand years. Emmeline returned as a hollow shell and killed herself. Oswin died when Eda was seven, leaving his children to pay by luring desperate people to the mirror. With only ten years remaining, the siblings are nearly free.

Their routine shatters when Bishop Florian Fane, a young, charismatic cleric, arrives with an escort of Blades, the Faithhood's militant enforcement arm. Fane announces the Patriarch has sent him to purge Blackbridge of demonic influence ahead of a Clerics' Conclave to name the Patriarch's successor. Ben insists they stop seeking clients, but Eda, emboldened by a private visit from Mr. Night, sneaks out alone to find one final mark. She lures a desperate gambler named Gregory back to the shop, only to notice hidden chainmail beneath his clothes and realize he is an undercover Blade. Eda stabs him with a penknife and screams for Ben, who kills Gregory, but a signal whistle has already summoned reinforcements. Ben and Lawrie force Eda into a sewer access chute and stay behind. Both brothers are arrested.

Hiding in the chute, Eda watches Fane summon Mr. Night and propose a scheme: in exchange for three thousand years, Mr. Night will unleash fiends, feral demonic creatures, upon Blackbridge. Fane will publicly "banish" them using Mr. Night's borrowed power, positioning himself as a divinely chosen savior. The terrified populace will flock to a blood ritual disguised as a pledge of faith, unknowingly signing away their years. Mr. Night also asks Fane to hunt down a shape-shifting demon hiding in the city. When Mr. Night spots Eda, she flees through the sewers and is intercepted by operatives of Severin Lich, a powerful crime lord who covets the Shaws' Gateway.

Lich agrees to help Eda find a demon unconnected to Mr. Night, in exchange for the mirror. His intelligence leads her to an apartment owned by High Governor Abelard Wolfram, Blackbridge's chief political ruler. There she discovers Kit'rath Ansellis, a demon living disguised among humans for twenty years. Kit is brash and initially hostile, but Eda offers fifty years of her life for his help rescuing her brothers and retrieving the mirror. When Blades arrive, Kit produces a Pact contract and cuts Eda's palm. She signs in blood without reading the terms. Kit fights their way out, transforming into a massive fanged stallion to carry her from the city.

They take refuge on the Oriana, a canal boat belonging to Robin, an unsanctioned alchemist and Kit's only friend. Robin crafts a Mantle of Concealment for Eda, a cape that causes others' attention to slide off the wearer. Kit's imp familiar, Tripp, brings news that the ruling lords of Infernus have learned Kit's brother Baelion has struck a Pact with a human cleric. Eda realizes that Baelion and Mr. Night are the same demon, making Kit his half-brother. Kit reveals that he was their mother's favored heir, and Baelion, consumed by jealousy, tormented him and broke one of his horns. When their mother died, Kit escaped through a Gateway into the Shaws' cellar and has been hiding in the mortal world ever since.

Using architectural plans that Wolfram reluctantly provides, Eda and Kit scout Fell Keep, the Blades' fortress, and identify a hidden passage connecting it to the Great Templehouse. During a fiend attack near the keep, a fiend bows to Eda instead of attacking, framing her as the creatures' master before Commander Martine Tenelle, the Blades' leader. Eda and Kit grow closer through shared vulnerability and arguments about courage. At a riverfolk bonfire, they share a charged dance, and Eda flees before she kisses him.

On the night of Fane's grand sermon, Eda infiltrates Fell Keep wearing the mantle while Kit hides as a mouse in her hood. They free Ben and Lawrie and escape through the hidden passage. Outside, a fiend bites Lawrie's calf before Fane commands it away. Robin warns that the bite carries a magical infection curable only by killing Mr. Night.

Kit confesses his feelings atop ancient standing stones along the river, and they share their first kiss. They consummate their relationship while hiding in a vacant house. Eda formulates a plan to expose Fane: find the Shaws' hidden mirror and use the Conclave to catch the bishop. They discover the Gateway inside a saint's sarcophagus in the Botanic Gardens. Kit departs to alert their allies, but Lich betrays Eda by warning Fane, who ambushes her at the mausoleum. Mr. Night emerges to taunt her. When Tenelle's Blades arrive, Fane commands fiends to slaughter his own men and frames Eda for the carnage. Tenelle privately strikes a deal: Eda will destroy Lich's Gateway while Tenelle uses the Shaws' mirror to trap Fane at the Conclave.

Ben arrives with devastating news: Lawrie is dying. Only killing Mr. Night can cure the infection. Eda begs Kit to fight his brother, but Kit refuses, paralyzed by lifelong fear. Eda calls him a coward, and he flies away. Tripp stays behind, pledging to help. Armed with Tenelle's Breakers, silver-alloy tools capable of shattering obsidian, Eda, Ben, and Tripp infiltrate Lich's underground headquarters and destroy his Gateway.

At the Clerics' Conclave on autumn harvest day, Tenelle interrupts the proceedings as Fane is about to be named Head Cleric. She wheels the Shaws' chained Gateway onto the dais and challenges Fane to destroy it. Fane reluctantly begins striking the mirror, but Mr. Night materializes to stop him, publicly confirming their Pact. The Faithhood's Alchemists, its sanctioned magic practitioners, activate a floor glyph that restricts Mr. Night's movement. He summons fiends through the intact Gateway and commands them to devour Fane alive. When he advances on Eda, she stabs him with the silver chisel. Kit crashes into the templehouse in his true demonic form, declaring he finally has something worth fighting for. The brothers battle savagely until Eda charges Baelion with a sword, buying Kit the moment to drive a silver arrow into his brother's neck. Ben shatters the Gateway, severing Baelion from his power. Kit decapitates him.

With Mr. Night dead, the Shaws' debt dissolves. Kit kneels before Eda with a broken sword, begging her to kill him so she can reclaim the fifty years she traded. Robin arrives and reveals she is herself a demon, concealed for decades by a golden pendant. She explains a loophole: Kit can transfer the years to another demon, and if Eda kills that demon, the years return. Robin volunteers, revealing she came to the mortal world for a human woman she loved, now long dead. Kit transfers the years, and Eda drives the sword into Robin's heart. Robin crumbles to ash, and Eda's lifespan is restored.

Lawrie recovers, and Ben is offered a position as a Blade recruit. Eda visits her parents' graves, forgives her father aloud, and boards the Oriana with Kit, setting off to destroy remaining Gateways and prevent future Pacts from ruining lives. Kit gives her his Ring of Shielding, a ring Robin crafted to conceal a demon's presence, carrying the weight of a lover's promise. The novel closes with an ominous flash-forward: "Later, of course, when everything tastes of ash and her heart lies cleaved in two, she will look back on this moment and wish desperately to have stayed within it forever" (375).