The Copper Promise

The Copper Promise is a fantasy novel by the English writer Jen Williams, published in 2014 and the first book of the Copper Cat trilogy.

Its two central characters are Wydrin of Crosshaven and Sir Sebastian, who work together as adventurers: they go into old places, deal with what they find and sell it afterwards. The stories about the caverns beneath the Citadel are the kind that circulate in taverns, full of mages, monsters and gods, and Wydrin has spent long enough in the trade to know that chasing rumours pays badly. A crippled nobleman changes the calculation by offering them a commission to go down and see for themselves, and what they disturb there is not a hoard but something that has been imprisoned and is now loose. The novel is the first of a trilogy that follows the same pair and the people they collect along the way.

Williams writes fantasy that mixes the business of adventuring with older, darker material about gods and what they leave behind.