To Break a Covenant

By Alison Ames

Debut voice Alison Ames delivers with a chilling, feminist thriller, perfect for fans of Wilder Girls and Sawkill Girls.


Moon Basin has been haunted for as long as anyone can remember. It started when an explosion in the mine killed sixteen people. The disaster made it impossible to live in town, with underground fires spewing ash into the sky. But life in New Basin is just as fraught. The ex-mining town relies on its haunted reputation to bring in tourists, but there’s more truth to the rumors than most are willing to admit, and the mine still has a hold on everyone who lives there.

Clem and Nina form a perfect loop—best friends forever, and perhaps something more. Their circle opens up for a strange girl named Lisey with a knack for training crows, and Piper, whose father is fascinated with the mine in a way that’s anything but ordinary. The people of New Basin start experiencing strange phenomena—sleepwalking, night terrors, voices that only they can hear. And no matter how many vans of ghost hunters roll through, nobody can get to the bottom of what’s really going on. Which is why the girls decide to enter the mine themselves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Sep 21, 2021
• ISBN: 9781645672074

Book preview

ONE

I sat in the graveyard waiting for Nina, drinking a slushie and sketching. It was the first day of summer vacation, and the sun was already baking the dew off the grass. My back was pressed against the pitted stone legs of an angel in the shadow of an old-money crypt, all cool marble and arching columns. There were rich people in this town once, and each of them was buried like royalty. Everyone had a statue. I was surrounded by angels and goddesses, elaborate crosses and gigantic engraved markers, but I was alone in the back half of the cemetery. No one living visited the people buried here.

I kept looking up and around. Nina never meant to scare me, but she moved fast and quiet, like a cat. I’d lost a lot of good beverages over the years when she’d popped out of nowhere like a jack-in-the-box. I took a sip and set the cup carefully next to the angel’s feet. The drawing I was working on was eluding me somehow; there was a shape in my mind that I couldn’t seem to get onto paper. I scratched out another attempt and started again.

Whatcha got?

I slammed both hands down onto the sketchbook, but I didn’t jump, and I didn’t scream. A rare achievement.

One of these days I’m gonna have a heart attack, I said, picking up the cup and moving so she could sit down next to me.

I’ll save you. She slid the book out of my hands and looked at it. What is this?

I’m not sure yet.

"I still can’t believe Ms. McKeown is letting you keep an art dream journal over the summer," she grumbled, flipping back a few pages.

It pays to underachieve, I said, grinning. If you weren’t so dead set on being the class of ‘04’s valedictorian, I bet you could have one, too.

She narrowed her eyes at me and held out her hand for the slushie. I gave it to her and she returned to the sketchbook. "What is this?"

I looked over her shoulder. Oh, that was a good one.

It looks like the three of us in the desert.

Yep, I said. "I watched The Mummy right before I went to sleep."

Does that make me Rachel Weisz? She swished her hair around as she quoted, "‘I … am a librarian.’"

Lisey’s hair is bigger than yours, I said. She’d be Rachel.

Nina nodded. Harsh but fair. She turned a few more pages back, pausing at a jagged, scribbled circle that filled the entire page, then flipped back to the one I’d been working on. So this is …

I don’t know, I said. In the dream I was in the woods in Old Town, and there was a shape with me, but I can’t remember it, I guess? I can’t make it, like, coalesce outside of my head.

She chewed on my straw for a moment and then said, Ghost.

Well, obviously, I said. It’s always a ghost.

She laughed. This town is so cracked.

An understatement if there ever was one. Like calling Ted Bundy kind of a bad guy.

Duh, I said. Why do you think we meet up in a graveyard all the time?

"Because we met here, dork. It’s the birthplace of our friendship."

The only nine-year-olds at a funeral, I said, nodding. They should have made us into a horror movie.

She elbowed me and got to her feet. "Let’s go already. The pool isn’t gonna get less crowded." She held out her hand and I took it, and she lifted me off the ground the same way she had on the day we met.

The whole town came to my father’s funeral. The men sweated in suits and ties and the women wore too-short cocktail dresses that they tried to make somber with veils and hats. The whole thing took less than an hour. My mother’s wrists were still bandaged.

Afterward we drove to the cemetery, separate cars all trailing the hearse. There wasn’t enough room for everyone to stand around the coffin. I pressed my back against the Kildare tomb, the marble only slightly cooler than the heavy air, watching the crowd. My mother was crying. I squeezed her hand and felt her fingers flex lightly in mine, the most motion she could summon. I wasn’t bored, exactly, but I couldn’t keep my mind on my father, supposedly in the box in front of us. I leaned my head back against the dead Kildares and watched a cloud sail in front of the sun.

After the crypt had been closed and Reverend Parker had said his piece, there was a mad dash to be the first to speak to my mother. People kept clasping her arms. Oops—sorry, June, I’m so sorry, are you all right? I mean, not—I know you’re not—sorry, sorry—

"He was such a good man, just such a good man—"

"I have a book that absolutely saved me when I lost Daniel, I’ll send it to you—"

In the crush of people trying to comfort her, I slipped away.

The cemetery was massive. I made two or three confused turns before I found myself in a completely deserted section of graveyard. It was the older part of the cemetery, where they put all the bodies they brought over from Old Moon Basin, and there was a sort of shambling, winding-down air to it that put me on edge. I sat down on the ledge running around a smaller mausoleum, my back against the robes of the least forbidding-looking angel, and surveyed the area cautiously. It was still hot, and the cloud I had watched had long since passed the sun, but I felt like I was sitting in shadow.

As I sat there staring at the crumbling gravestones, my head began to swim. My vision started to go white around the edges and I could feel my heart leaping in my chest, a swooping, hollow sensation that made me gasp for air. The gravestones tilted, drawing me toward them. I gripped the stone beneath me, breathing shallowly, and suddenly a small sweet face appeared in front of me. For one paralyzing moment, I was sure it was one of the angels, climbed down from its marble pedestal to grab me, to get me, and I was drawing breath to scream when it spoke.

You look weird, she said. Are you okay?

You look weird, I snapped, instinctively defensive, angry at myself for being scared. I wanted to get up and walk away, but I didn’t trust my body just then. I pressed farther back into the angel’s robes.

The girl plopped down on the ground in front of me, folding her legs into a pretzel. Okay, she said.

I kept my eyes fixed on the gravestone ahead—Myrna Walters. I tried to breathe evenly and waited for her to leave.

Is the funeral for your family?

I didn’t speak.

I know it is, she said. My dad said we should go.

She flicked a pebble at me. It hit my shoulder with a soft thwip and fell into my lap. I whipped it back at her, harder than I meant to. What’s it to you?

She shrugged, rubbing at her arm where I’d hit her. I just thought you looked sad, is all. Sorry. She pushed herself up off the ground. Hope you feel better.

Her hair swung around her shoulders as she turned to leave. Something twanged in my chest, my heart clenched and unclenched, and I blurted out, Wait.

She looked back at me, popped her hip, and folded her arms. She raised her eyebrows.

I’m sorry, I said. I am sad. I’m sorry.

She sat back down. I’m Nina.

Clem. We sat there in silence for a while, and finally I said, My dad died.

Nina nodded. That’s what my dad said. He wouldn’t tell me how.

I didn’t know then either. I didn’t know until Danny Nelson told me on the last day of eighth grade and I punched him in the face.

My mom wouldn’t tell me either. But she was in the hospital for a while after. I studied the weeds growing up around the base of the stone I was sitting on. I stayed at the motel.

Three days alone there, lying on the scratchy coverlet while the air conditioner poured cold across my skin. Anson and Sherlene Perry came by in the mornings with food, bottles of water. They disconnected the cable so I couldn’t watch the news, gave me a stack of movies. I watched The Last Unicorn seven times. I floated in the pool. I waited for my mother to come and get me.

Nina pursed her lips. Was it fun?

I guess. The vending machine has orange soda. My dress was scratchy, and it stuck to my back in the heat. Why did your dad say you had to come?

She looked a little embarrassed when she said, He saw you at the motel. He works there.

I thought about the man that I’d seen refilling the ice machine, skimming the pool. He’d smiled at me.

He thinks my mom is dead, she said. Her face was doll smooth, totally blank.

What? It took a moment to settle in my brain, and then I asked, Why?

She drove off the road. They only found her car. We had a funeral, too.

How come they couldn’t find her?

I don’t know. She tucked her hair behind her ear and tilted her head so that the dark wing of it swept out across her back.

That’s really sad, I said. At least I knew where my dad was. At least I could visit him.

I was little. She looked down, but not before I saw the glint of tears in her eyes. She pushed some dirt around with the toe of her shoe, making a tiny hill and then flattening it again. After a minute, she looked back up at me. He said you looked like you needed a friend.

I wanted to try for nonchalance, to impress this blunt, lanky girl with the kind eyes, but I’ve never been wired for cool. I closed my eyes and thanked her father silently. I guess I do, I said, swallowing the lump in my throat.

She smiled then, and I felt the shadow recede. Do you wanna leave?

I looked over my shoulder, back toward the main part of the cemetery. The crowd was starting to disperse. I think we have to do the—the after thing, I said reluctantly. Back at the house.

She stood up and held out her hand.

We’ll go together, then.

Paranormal America, Episode 1

Unused Footage

(An elderly man sits in a rocking chair in what appears to be his living room. Seated across from him is a young woman holding a clipboard. The boom mic is visible in the top right corner of the frame.)

KEITH JEPSON: Oh, a’course I remember when the mine blew up. I knew Vinnie Freeman. Fine man. Fine man. A shame he didn’t manage to get that wife of his pregnant before he died. We coulda used another Freeman in this town. And a’course she left after the whole kerfuffle. Should have been an example for that other’un.

SIOBHAN SINCLAIR: You’re referring to Mellie Harington. (She glances at the camera.) The wife of the miner believed to have caused the explosion.

JEPSON: Oh, ayuh. Loony bird. Wa’nt her fault, poor thing, but she sure did make for good newspaper. Guess she rather’d Sidney be crazy than admit he got a bunch of good men killed ‘cause he was stealin’ from the mine.

SINCLAIR: Did you ever experience—then or now—any of the paranormal phenomena that other residents of the town reported? I understand that you and your wife didn’t want to move to the new Basin even after the ash started falling.

(JEPSON purses his lips and blows a weak raspberry. He waves a hand.)

JEPSON: We never. Irma sometimes slept-walked, I guess, but she did that before the mine blew up.

(His eyes flick upward, staring at something above the camera.)

JEPSON: I never had any kind of … what do you say? Paranormal. Nothin’ like that. We just didn’t want to leave our house.

SINCLAIR: And what about now? Do you still believe you’re unaffected by whatever presence exists here?

JEPSON: We built that house, y’know. From the ground up.

SINCLAIR: Sir—

JEPSON: Wa’nt fair of the gov’ment to make us leave. We’re citizens. We have rights.

SINCLAIR: I understand. If we could just—

JEPSON: What business is it of theirs, a person wants to die in his own home?

SINCLAIR: —just go back to—

JEPSON: We tried to sue, y’know. Don’t remember if I told you that. Lawyer said we didn’t have a case. Because it was for our welfare.

SINCLAIR: Sir—

JEPSON: Now I’m gonna die in this goddamn trailer.

(SINCLAIR looks at the camera and makes a slashing motion at her neck. A hand closes over the lens, and then there is darkness.)

TWO

My mom was a surgeon—the Basin’s only surgeon—before my dad died. Then she went into the mine, and the tendons in her wrists got cut so deep they couldn’t be repaired. She got carpal tunnel gloves and a job at the grocery store, and the two of us got a different life.

Less than a month after the funeral, we moved into a two-bedroom trailer in a park so close to the end of High Grange Road that it didn’t even have a name. We were shuffling down the ramp of the moving truck, holding my mattress, when I saw Nina in the common yard. I flashed her a smile as I fought to keep my grip, afraid to put the full weight of the mattress onto my mother’s damaged arms. We wrestled the mattress inside and came back out, and I paused for a second while my mom ducked back into the truck.

Are you moving in? Nina asked.

I nodded and she beamed. The trailer she had come out of was directly across from ours, sunflowers blooming cheerily around its front stoop.

You should come over for dinner tonight, she said. You and your mom. My dad will make something really nice. Have you ever had real Mexican food?

My mom works tonight, I said, my heart sinking. Overnight.

Well, you should definitely come over, then. Sleepover! Or I can come to your house.

Um—

Come on, she urged, taking both of my hands in hers. It’ll be fun.

I promised I’d ask and she disappeared back inside her trailer. As my mom and I continued moving our stuff in, I caught her peeking out her bedroom window, which looked directly into mine. She gave a tiny wave, and her face looked worried. I could tell she was afraid she’d been too pushy. I smiled at her through the windows and waved back, trying to put her at ease. When my mother left for work that night, I followed her out, then crossed the yard to the sunflower stoop. The door swung open before I could knock.

Yay! Nina cried, clapping her hands together. She turned and yelled something in Spanish and a man’s voice replied. She turned back to me and grinned. Come on in.

Her father came out of the kitchen, a blue towel slung over his shoulder. He was smaller than I’d thought he was when I’d seen him at the motel, but he had Nina’s eyes, and he smiled at me as he took my hand.

I’m sorry about your father, he said. I’m Nina’s dad. You can call me Paul.

Over dinner he told us stories about his job, the strange things he’d found, the people he’d met. The time he’d been snowed in a few winters ago. At one point I laughed so hard I coughed a grain of rice out of my nose and froze, completely mortified, until the two of them started howling with mirth. I felt more and more at ease as the evening passed, and time went by so quickly that I was surprised when Paul finally pushed back his chair and stood.

I have to go to sleep, girls, he said, collecting our plates. Mr. Perry wants me at work bright and early tomorrow.

When is the pool open again? Nina asked.

End of the school year, he answered, patting her head as he walked toward his bedroom. Night, girls. Sleep tight. Love you.

Nina made a face at me and then broke into a smile.

Did you bring PJs? She stood, shoving her chair back. I have some super-cute ones that’re too small for me now. C’mon.

The pajamas fit after I rolled the cuffs a few times. They were perfectly worn in, and wearing them made me feel like I belonged there, in the trailer with the sunflower stoop. We sat on Nina’s bed, watched horror movies on her tiny bedroom TV and talked, chewing on gummy bears and shrieking with laughter at all the bad special effects. After a long time, as the moonlight glowed around the edges of her curtains, we fell asleep next to each other, holding hands.

Everyone in town warned Paul about getting a pet. Kim, who owned the liquor store, told him about the schnauzer puppy that disappeared out of her front yard. One of the waitresses at the diner moved away after her dog Snaps went rabid. Everyone old enough to be a parent here had a dead pet story, and that’s why none of their kids had any.

A cat won’t last, they told him. Get her a snake. Get her a fish. Something cold-blooded. But Nina wanted something soft and warm that she could hold, and Paul wanted her to be happy, so Toast came home.

You can’t let him outside, Paul said with his hand resting on the carrier, making eye contact with each of us in turn. It’s not safe.

The coyotes of Moon Basin hunt up in the hills, but they come down into town during the new moon when everything is pitch-black and quiet. They move without a sound, walking up and down the streets, pausing to look in people’s windows. No one’s ever seen them kill anything, but any animal that gets outside at night, it’s not there the next morning. Or it’s there, but it’s chewed open, and it’s clear it didn’t die quick.

I didn’t feel Toast get up from between us and jump down off the bed. I’m a light sleeper. I know Nina blamed me, even though she tried not to. I imagine he prowled through the trailer before he saw the window above the kitchen sink. It was slightly ajar, as it often was, but on that night there was the very beginning of a tear in the screen that had gone unnoticed by the three of us. Toast leaped up onto the counter, put his nose to the window. He wriggled through the hole, still such a tiny cat, and then he was gone.

We found him on the side of High Grange Road with his feet chewed off.

Nina threw up and I held her hair, and then we sat on the gravel and held each other and cried. We buried him in the field right then, scraping out the grave with our bare hands, dirt caking the tear tracks on our faces. Nina said a prayer in Spanish, and I repeated the words as best I could. Paul looked sad and small at dinner that night. He put his hand on Nina’s very briefly before he said, I’m so sorry, mijita.

"It’s not your fault," she said, her meaning clear.

Paul’s voice sharpened as he replied, There is nothing wrong with Moon Basin. What happened to Toast was an accident.

Her chin jutted out the way it did when she felt accused. People in other towns have cats.

I know.

And those cats don’t die.

He looked even smaller then. He rested his hands on the edge of the table, staring down at his splayed fingers. I know, he said again, quieter. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let you get a cat. I should have listened.

I was trying very hard not to cry, staring into my plate, thinking about Toast and how if we had never met him, he would be alive somewhere else.

Maybe in a few months, when we’re a little bit less sad, we can think about getting something that lives in a cage, so it can’t get out.

I don’t want a cage, Nina said sullenly, stabbing her fork at individual kernels of corn. That’s mean.

Well, that’s a good point, he said, almost pleading with her. That’s very kind of you to think about.

Stab, stab.

So, okay. No cage. We’ll just keep hanging out, the two of us. But someday when you’re older, after you graduate from college and move somewhere else, you can have all the cats you want. He smiled at her. As long as you promise to come and visit your papa.

There was a long silence before she laid the fork down. At last she looked up at him.

Well, duh, she said, and that was that.

Later, when she thought I was asleep, I heard her crying. I reached across the Toast-sized gap between us and took her hand.

Grave Encounters, Episode 12

Unused Footage

(A girl wearing a corseted dress crouches in the middle of a fallow field. Her black hair is drawn into spiky pigtails. Her hands, when she lifts the mic, are gloved in fishnet.)

BATTY: Are you getting it? Can you see it if I’m crouching?

DAWSON BROWNE, from off-screen: Your skirt’s kind of in the way, can you just—?

(BATTY shifts her weight, pulling the skirt back to reveal the small dead animal lying in front of her.)

BROWNE: Yeah, better. It’s still kind of hard to tell what it is, though. I wish we had something to, like, hold it up with.

BATTY: I mean, I’ll grab it.

BROWNE: Batty, Christ, don’t be weird.

(She bares her teeth at the camera and looks back down at the animal.)

BATTY: Maybe we can start without me in the shot. Like a real close-up zoom of it and then you pan out to show I’m here.

(The camera zooms in on the little corpse, revealing it to be a rabbit with its spine torn out. Its eyes have