Page 46 of A Fate Everlasting

“Yes.” He didn’t look at me. “Survive.”

“About that,” I asked. “Say we make it. After we graduate, if we become immortal, is it true we can never die?”

“No,” Dorian shook his head. “We become immortal in the sense that our lives lengthen. We become stronger. Death is a very real possibility. It’s just…harder.”

“Listen, mate,” Hugo interjected, voice hoarse. “Maybe we should just—” He stopped himself, shaking his head. “If we head back now, if we apologize, maybe Verrine will resurrect all three of us.”

“Great idea.” Dorian let out ahumph. “Resurrecting three students at once, that’ll be easy.”

I let out a sigh. “We’re not leaving. Dante didn’t sell the cards, which means he still has them. How far could he have gone?”

“I doubt he’s left Avernus, the capital.” Dorian nodded. “Let’s split up, attack the city from the four quarters. Arabella, you take the lower right. Hugo, lower left. I’ll take the other two.”

“Wait,” I felt my heart clench. “Is it a good idea to venture off?Alone?”

“No.” Dorian’s expression remained neutral. “But we are running out of time, fast. Who knows when Dante will leave Avernus, or if he already has?”

I rolled my eyes, the weight of Elsewhere pressing in around me.

“Cavendish is right.” Hugo shifted beside me, rubbing the back of his neck. “But I don’t like it.”

“We have to?” I asked as he reached for my waist, pulling me close, his brows furrowed.

“I think so.” Hugo’s grip tightened, one firm squeeze before letting go. “Be safe, Arabella.”

I swallowed hard. “You too.”

Dorian let out an impatient sigh. “As riveting as thisconversation is, unless you want to stay here for eternity, I’d suggest moving.”

My hands balled into fists at my sides as I strode away from them. My footsteps were silent as I wove through the city, ducking beneath overhangs and out of the reach of overzealous wraiths. I felt an unnerving prickle peel down my spine like someone spilled icy water. Breaths weren’t necessary when you were dead, but they sure as hell helped to calm me down.

A few faded black metal signs etched with silver writing led me to the right quarter, and soon, the narrow streets opened into a center district that looked more lively. Outside, wraiths and Luminari dined at shady cafes along the street and beneath the light of flickering gas lamps. I jumped out of the way as a darkened carriage rode past, pulled by two steeds of deepest black, the curtains twitching shut.

A notice board leaned crooked beside a lamplit café, plastered with overlapping sheets. One flyer caught my eye, edged in silver. “Day Fourteen: No Archangel Sightings.” Someone had inked over it.Let them rot. Let him rise.

The farther I walked, the more the city seemed to pulse, like something just beneath its surface had taken notice of me. A faint pressure settled against my skin. My fingers brushed absently against the hollow of my throat, catching the chain of my necklace.

I stopped abruptly, turning toward the glass window of a shopfront. It was warped and dust-streaked, the light from within casting jagged, uneven reflections. And yet, my own reflection wasn’t jagged at all. It wasn’t warped like the others.

I took a step closer, watching the others pass by. The wraiths and Daemons flickered strangely in the glass, their images breaking apart like ink dissolving in water. But I remained solid, whole. Was I not fully dead?

The cold prickle continued to creep down my spine.Whatever it meant, I knew it couldn’t be good. The wraith closest to me turned, its hollow eyes glinting with something like curiosity. Then, almost imperceptibly, its lips curled. Not into a sneer, not into a smile, but something close to recognition.

I looked away and kept walking. Panic rose in my throat, quickening the pace of my should-be-still heart. I felt a thousand black eyes boring into me as I crossed into the shade. I swallowed the fear and pressed onwards.

If I were Dante, where would I go? I had nothing to go on but intuition, so I switched my mind off and let myself be guided by it. It took an hour of wandering, but my eye caught a flash of something dressed in gray, all too bright to be of this world. Someone trying to blend in but failing miserably.Could it be him?

If it was, the deep black of Dante’s hair had not faded with death. The figure was far too large and burly to be disguised amongst the slender wraiths and pallid gray tones of the undead Luminari. He stuck out, so poorly disguised. I just needed to see hisface.

An older woman jutted out in front of me. No, not a woman. A crease-winged creature wearing the loose suggestion of one. Wide, dust-brown moth wings unfurled from the curve of her spine, each panel veined in tarnished gold. Downy antennae quivered where human eyebrows should have been, testing the air, her irises quicksilver. My throat bobbed.

“Come inside.” Her voice rasped like paper tearing. She gestured to the crooked sign overhead,MYSTIC MAGDALENA’S, while the wings tucked cloak-like around her shoulders. “A reading costs only a drop of blood.”

“I’ll pass,” I muttered, trying to peel her fingers off my wrist. They weren’t fingers at all, I realized, but chitinous segments ending in little hooks. Her one hand broke free, her fingerstwitching toward my necklace, but the moment they clasped around it a spark erupted.

She shook her injured hand, smile needle-thin. “I can help you find him.”

“Who?”

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