The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy (2022) is the first novel in a new romantasy series by American author Megan Bannen, whose previous works include Soulswift (2020) and The Bird and Blade (2018). The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy follows a curmudgeonly demigod marshal, Hart Ralston, and his enemies-to-lovers romance with a bubbly human undertaker named Mercy Birdsall. Amid this dynamic, the two must navigate a dangerous plot involving old gods, zombies, and a rival funeral services operation that is trying to destroy Mercy’s small family business. Hart and Mercy must ultimately choose between the pain of loneliness and the risks of vulnerability while exploring complex issues of mortality and achieving a balance between duty and personal fulfillment.

This guide refers to the 2022 paperback edition, published by Orbit Books.

Plot Summary

Marshal Hart Ralston takes an unidentified body to Birdsall & Son, one of the few undertaking businesses that has the necessary government license to process the bodies of unidentified indigents who have no existing burial arrangements and have been killed in the magical region of Tanria, where lost souls infect human bodies and become zombie-like drudges. At Birdsall & Son, Hart encounters his nemesis, Mercy Birdsall, and the two insult each other, though they each secretly find each other attractive.

At the marshal’s station, Hart’s boss and friend, Alma Maguire, lectures him about overworking himself and advises him to find a new partner to help him patrol the region of Tanria. Hart reflects on his lack of family; he still mourns the death of his mentor, Bill, which occurred years ago, and he also regrets having an argument with Alma that damaged their friendship. Lonely, Hart writes a letter addressed only to “a friend,” knowing that the nimkilim—magical talking animals who serve as postal workers—will not be able to deliver it to someone who does not exist.

Meanwhile, Mercy worries about her father, who had a heart attack six months ago. For years, Mercy has been running the office and helping her father while they wait for her younger brother, Zeddie, to complete trade school and officially inherit the business. Now, however, Zeddie returns and tells Mercy that he failed the Funeral Rites degree and has no intention of taking over the family business. He begs Mercy to keep his failure a secret from their father. Mercy is hurt that her brother does not want to save the business that she loves so much, but she agrees to keep his secret. She is also keeping a secret for her sister, Lillian, who is pregnant and does not want the family to know yet.

That evening, the local nimkilim, Horatio, delivers a letter to Mercy. It is addressed to “a friend,” but she does not know that Hart is the writer—just as he does not know that she has received his letter. She is touched by the anonymous writer’s loneliness and regret. Feeling similarly lonely and unheard by her own family, Mercy responds to the letter.

To Hart’s annoyance, Alma assigns him an apprentice named Penrose Duckers. Hart quizzes Duckers on his knowledge of Tanria, where marshals patrol for poachers who try to open unauthorized portals into the magical realm. The marshals are also duty-bound to fight off any drudges they encounter. While Hart and Duckers are camping in Tanria, their nimkilim, Bassareus, arrives with mail, including a reply to Hart’s anonymous letter. Shocked, Hart eagerly writes back to his new pen pal.

Over the next few weeks, Hart and Mercy write letters to each other, and neither of them realizes who their secret friend is. Meanwhile, Mercy’s business rival, Curtis Cunningham, is trying to buy out Birdsall & Son. Mercy fears that her family will go out of business if Zeddie does not help, but Zeddie announces that he wants to be a chef.

One day, Hart and Duckers arrive at Birdsall & Son to process more bodies, and Hart and Mercy bicker, as they always do. Later, Duckers observes that Hart puts on a mask of cruel behavior with Mercy in order to conceal the fact that he likes her and is afraid that she will not reciprocate his interest. Hart denies this, but Duckers’s comment makes him think. As time goes by, Mercy and Hart continue to bicker in person, but through their anonymous letters to one another, they continue to bond. Meanwhile, the secrets that Mercy is keeping for her siblings finally come to light. When Lillian learns about Mercy’s secret pen pal, she urges Mercy to meet with him in person.

Mercy asks her pen pal to meet at a café, and he agrees. When Hart arrives at the café, he sees Mercy waiting and is mortified to realize that she must be his pen pal. Horrified, he resolves not to reveal his identity as the letter-writer. He enters the café and begins to verbally spar with her, tormenting her. They part in anger, and Hart decides to burn the letters and never speak to her again. However, when he receives one last letter from Mercy, in which Mercy reveals her true identity to her still-unknown pen pal, he decides to tell her the truth.

He returns to town just in time to save Mercy from a rogue drudge on the street and suddenly realizes that he loves her. That night, they dance together at a town festival, then return to Mercy’s apartment, flirting and feeling the shift between them. They sleep together that night, and Hart asks her out on a date before returning to Tanria. However, he procrastinates and avoids telling her that he is the author of the anonymous letters. 

Over the next three months, Hart and Mercy date one another openly. Duckers insists that Hart tell Mercy that he is her pen pal, but Hart continues to hesitate. Meanwhile, Cunningham has blocked all rival undertakers from purchasing lumber, and Mercy and Lillian try to find out what Cunningham is planning.

In Tanria, Hart and Duckers are attacked by a drudge cluster near Sector 28, the same place in which Hart’s mentor, Bill, died years ago. They are wounded and return to town. Because Hart is a demigod, his wounds heal rapidly, and his quick recovery indicates that he may be immortal. This possibility is his greatest fear because he has no wish to watch all of his loved ones die while he lives on forever. When he attends dinner with Mercy and her family, he lies about the extent of his injuries. However, Mercy learns the truth and demands an explanation.

He tells Mercy about his potential immortality and explains the circumstances of Bill’s death, which took place in Sector 28 in Tanria: an area of intense yet unexplained drudge activity. Hart’s demigod lineage allows him to perceive souls as they leave the body. Years ago, he and Bill believed that the site in Sector 28 marked the entrance to the underworld and that if they could open the locked door to this realm, the lost souls causing the formation of drudges would return to where they belonged and leave the world in peace. However, when they tried to open this portal, Hart failed, and Bill died. 

After Hart explains his past to Mercy, she finds her pen pal letters among his belongings and realizes that he has been keeping his identity as the letter-writer a secret ever since they started dating in real life. She tells him to leave and declares that she never wants to see him again. Heartbroken, Hart returns to Tanria. Meanwhile, Mercy and Lillian discover that Cunningham is attempting to defraud the government by shipping bodies into Tanria to create more drudges. Together, they catch Cunningham in the act and have him arrested.

Devastated over losing Mercy, Hart decides that he must finish what he and Bill started years before. He returns to Sector 28, determined to open the portal and send the lost souls back to where they belong. As he reaches the site, drudges attack  and wound him. When he opens the portal, the lost souls are pulled through, taking Hart with them into the realm of the dead, where he finally meets his divine father: the Warden, the god who guards the door to the underworld. The Warden explains that he left his post decades ago and tried existing in the world of the living for a while. He fell in love with Hart’s mother, but when the Warden left the underworld, hundreds of souls became trapped in Tanria. Now, by sending the souls back to the underworld, Hart has fixed his father’s mistake. The Warden adds that although Hart is not immortal, he will receive one more life. The Warden sends Hart back to the world of the living.

In Tanria, the marshals panic as all of the drudges suddenly drop dead. The marshals take the bodies to Mercy and the other undertakers, who spend a sleepless night processing all of the bodies and prepping them for burial. With dread, Mercy suddenly realizes what Hart has done and sends Alma to find him. Alma returns with Hart, who has suffered severe wounds and appears to be dead. Suddenly, he begins to breathe again, and his wounds heal. When he wakes, he and Mercy reconcile and kiss.

In the epilogue, Hart walks home from his rounds as the new town sheriff. Mercy, who is now the official owner of Mercy’s Undertakings, greets Hart with a kiss, and they dance together.