The Mortal Sleep

Book excerpt: Months have passed since the events at Belshazzar’s Feast. Vie Eliot, reluctant psychic and self-appointed defender of the small Wyoming town called Vehpese, knows that trouble is coming, but for the time being, he wants to spend as many happy days as he can with his boyfriend. Until one night, two men arrive and blow up a car. They threaten to do more damage unless Vie leaves town. Immediately. That same night, a woman appears at Vie’s door, asking Vie to look for her missing children. The job seems simple: they have been taken by their estranged father. But in Vehpese, nothing is simple—especially not the disappearances of children. As Vie searches for the children, he discovers that he is not the only one looking for them. Worse, Urho Rattling-Tent and Lady Buckhardt, a seemingly immortal pair of supernatural creatures who have plagued the area for centuries, have begun to assemble an army, and Vie and his friends are outmatched. As time begins to run out for the missing children, Vie draws closer to a final battle with Lady Buckhardt and Urho, a battle he knows he is not prepared to win. Before he can conquer his physical demons, Vie must find answers about himself and his own past and what he has heard other supernaturals call the mortal sleep. Those answers might give him the knowledge he needs to defeat Urho and Lady Buckhardt—if the truth doesn’t break Vie first.