Chapter One At well past midnight on an early summer Sunday, I had time on my hands and a dead man on my mind. I walked down a darkened gravel road, with only the light of a bone-white moon and its dazzling company of stars to guide me. Surrounded by a familiar blanket of night, I pondered the life of a vampire. Before I’d run away from my life and responsibilities in New York to escape to Southern Manitoba, a vampire named Holden Chancery had helped save me from the brink of certain death. During my recovery, the vampire council we both served handed me his death warrant. I had successfully completed a seemingly impossible job for the council, and as a reward they told me I had to kill one of my only friends. I wasn’t sure if vampires understood the concept of stress leave, but it didn’t stop me from pulling a vanishing act and crossing international borders. I stood at the intersection of the gravel road I’d been traveling and the deserted highway it bisected, and hesitated before making my way across the blacktop. I was going to go into the small town on the opposite side of the highway when something caught my eye. It was only a brief flash of movement, but enough to grab my attention. My whole body tensed. Staying as still as an owl tuned