Page 97 of A Fate Everlasting

I tugged on the Thread, just slightly. I didn’t expect it to respond. I caught Dante’s eyeline from across the room. “Why are the cards here?”

“Siphoning,”the Thread whispered, weaving through mymind. I was surprised Dante responded.“The energy drawn from the students when they die feeds into the deck, keeping the Archangels trapped. If you Fall, the daughter of an Archangel, it might be the sacrifice we need to ensure they never open again.”

A chasm opened in my gut. The king had more to gain from this ceremony than a few more Daemons for his legion. Every Fall, every death, was an effort to strengthen the binding. But he had made a mistake bringing them here. I was sure of it.

Focus, Arabella.There had to be something I could do. I tried to remember what Godwin had said. He seemed to thinkmyblood could free them. He’d told me I just needed to die.

A thought struck so hard it jolted my spine. Blood of a Fallen Angel…thatwas how they bound the deck, just before I was called to Evermore. It clicked. My motherwasthat Fallen Angel, and she died the very night she’d given me the necklace. The car accident that had claimed my parents’ life wasn’t fate, it was a bloodletting.A sacrifice.

Verrine said I was late. My attendance at Evermore was overdue one year. Maybe my mother had refused to give me up, refused to honor her bargain with the High King and trade me to Evermore. So he’dtakenher instead, and then taken her life to seal away the Archangels.

But it hadn’t worked. Her blood hadn’t been enough.

The High King had faith that I was the answer. That if I Fell, I could shift the power balance of light and dark enough that the cards would remain sealed. The Archangels would be too weak to escape, and the After would crumble. But if my hunch was correct, he had missed something.

The edges of the deck were still frayed. It was hard to catch in the dim light, but threads of ether were unwinding like seams splitting like a rope that had been stretched too tight. The Arcana were unraveling all on their own.

The Archangels were still fighting from within, and maybethey wouldn’t need much help at all, now. After all, Godwin had been found with the cards soaked in blood. They’d assumed it was his, but it wasmine.The blood of an opposite. The blood the cards needed to set them free.

I just had to die.

A cry rang out, muffled, the sound carving through me. My head snapped, and I saw her. They dragged Ruby forward from behind the Crucible. She looked thin, weak, deep bruises beneath her eyes as they forced her toward the chalice. Verrine beamed at her, robes glimmering like the rays of a false sun. Overhead, the Crucible dimmed.

“Lilibeth,” I hissed. “Your slate.”

Lilibeth nodded, wiping away tears again as she flashed the screen toward me. Ruby sat at a flatzero.The two elements that might have vied for her survival, her score and strength, made this a probabilistic impossibility. She was going to die.Actuallygoing to die, right here on this stage in front of everyone. Just like the two students before her.

A guard pushed her toward the chalice, her hands weaving around it. Her eyes were wide, pleading, and utterly terrified. She didn’t deserve to die like this.

“Wait.” I lurched forward, pushing through the line of Lower Sixth students to the front. “NO?—”

The High King turned his head slowly, silver eyes gleaming like diamonds. “Apt timing, Arabella. If not her next,” he said, voice ice-smooth, “then you.”

The words rattled through the space between us, final, inevitable. My lungs seized, my mind clawing for a plan.Anything, anything—but there was nothing. I had no choice but to take the Rift in her place. I had no choice but to die.

And maybe that was exactly what I needed to do.

“Fine.” I paused. I need a moment, a moment to think. “Iknow you need me to make therightchoice. I will. But let her go. Let anyone who doesn’t want to take the Riftgo.”

“I’m not here to barter, Arabella Davenant,” the king said cooly. He lifted a hand. Verrine raised the chalice to Ruby’s lips. The dark liquid inside rippled, viscous, catching the etherlight like oil.

“STOP! I know you need me. I will do this right. I will take the Riftyourway.” My voice tore through the chapel, ricocheting against the great stone arches. The flames in the torches guttered, the ether in the Crucible shuddered, and for the first time, something shifted.

The High King turned to me slowly, his mouth curling with expectation. He was pleased. With a flick of his wrist, Verrine pulled the chalice away.

Ruby collapsed, her knees hitting the stone with a sickening crack. Her shoulders trembled, her chest rising and falling in shallow waves. My hands clenched, nails biting into my palms. Every instinct in my body screamed at me to run to her, to drop to my knees beside her.

I couldn’t move, or break character yet. I was still playing the part of obedience. The High King was watching me closely.

My fingers brushed over my throat. The chain still hung there, cool against my skin. The Lumen. The thing that had defied death, again and again, rested cold against my skin. My fingers found the clasp. Removing it would kill me, which is exactly what I needed. No one else would have to die. Not if I did.

If I died, if I removed the necklace and Fell, the sacrifice would work. The opposite of a Fallen Angel’s blood wasn’t the blood of an Angel. It was the blood of an innocent, the blood of someone who never sought to tangle themselves in the darkness. It was clear to me now. It couldn’t be clearer. I was the opposite of my mother, her foil in every way.

Her blood locked the deck. Mine would unlock it.

I unclasped the necklace and pressed the pendant to my chest one last time. I felt the cold press of it against the palm of my hand as I walked slowly toward the dais.Blood must be spilled to reclaim what was lost.I wasn’t the answer. My death was. The perfect paradox. The perfect sacrifice.

And I wasnothinglike my mother.

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