Page 30 of A Fate Everlasting

I meant Evermore andeverythingthat came after it. I wasn’t interested in delaying this any further. My palms were slick with sweat as I grabbed my coat and opened the door, hoping someone would remember me if I vanished tonight.

I stepped into the mist, the night curling cold against my skin, thick with the murmurs of the dead. Ahead, the courtyard stretched vast and endless, bloated with fog, its edges dissolving into shadow. Souls that had never been saved lingered in the haze, flickering like dying embers trapped in the space between what was and what could never be.

Dante stood beneath the archway, his black shirt unbuttoned at the collar, his usual rolled cigarette resting between two fingers. That scent, smoke, spice, andsomething far older, lingered in the cold air. He watched me approach, one brow arching in lazy amusement. He looked far too calm. It didn’t match the swirling storm in my chest, the weight of what we were about to do. I wanted to turn around. I didn’t.

“Let’s get this over with,” I said, my teeth chattering against the cold.

“Verrine has eyes everywhere.” His gaze flickered past me, scanning the dark. “Just follow me.”

We slipped through the winding corridors, the silence thick between us. The deeper we went, the colder the air turned.It felt as though the very walls were holding their breath, as though something unseen stirred beneath the stone.

Evermore was a labyrinth of vaulted ceilings and twisting staircases, of forgotten hallways and doors that looked like they had not opened in centuries. But Dante moved as though he had mapped its every secret, his steps unfaltering.

We reached the end of the hall, where an arched wooden door loomed before us. A dull ache bloomed behind my eyes as I squinted in the darkness. A tarnished plaque read:

The Hall of Artifacts. Entry is strictly forbidden under codes 4-7 of the Student Handbook.

“What a shame.” I smiled. “I never got a copy of that handbook.” A low hum crackled over my skin, a whisper of unseen energy that sent a shiver down my spine. Instinct had my fingers closing around my slate as if checking it would confirm what I already felt. I was being watched.But the score didn’t matter anymore, nothing did.

Present: 64.

Lower.It was falling. I forced my feelings down, swallowing the instinct to run.

Dante’s smirk was all satisfaction. He lifted an old, rusted key, and the lock clicked open. “Evermore’s security is lax,” he murmured, stepping inside. “They think our fear will keep us in line.”

“I can see how that works,” I admitted. “If you care to compete.”

I had seen places like the Hall of Artifacts before. My parents' study had been filled with relics and forgotten things. I shook my head, unable to look away from the massive crystal balls and lifelike statues. A shiver crawled down my spine at the sight of an old rag-doll with long dark hair.

I moved past a glass case, barely sparing the artifacts inside a glance. Then, I saw it. Something small, tucked into the shadows so neatly it was almost begging to be ignored. A feather, or what was left of it.

It was brittle, the edges darkened like it had been burned and cased in glass. But something about it, the weight in my chest, made my fingers twitch. I knew this. I’d seen this before. I just didn’t know how.

I reached for the glass, but a hand closed around my wrist firmly. “Focus,” Dante demanded.

I barely heard him. “What is it?”

His grip remained firm, unmoving. “A relic. A Vestige of a greater power.” He spoke carefully. “From a Fallen Angel.”

“A Fallen Angel?” I murmured. “How are they different from a Daemon?”

Dante breathed through his nose, a sound caught between frustration and restraint. “They’re more myth than anything. But if theyarereal,” he continued, “there aren’t many left. The legend says they can’t have children. Their bloodlines die with them.”

If the universe itself had cast judgment upon them, punishment for their very existence, they must be a terrible, terrible thing.

A shudder coiled its way up my spine. My gaze drifted, catching on another doll. A tattered, hollow thing with long, dark hair, its glassy eyes vacant, its small limbs stiff with neglect. It was the kind of toy a child should have cherished yet had been abandoned instead. It was clear it wasn’t out of loss or forgetfulness, but out of something else. Out of fear.

“What’s your motive, then?” I said, needing something solid to hold onto. This place was beginning to make my skin crawl.

Dante turned, and a shadow passed over his face. “The thing we’re looking for belongs to me.” He paused. Then, quieter. “Part of it, anyway.”

“And what is that thing?”

“Just a deck of cards,” Dante said. I narrowed my eyes.A deck of cards?

“That's hardly enough to get me expelled, Dante.”

He tilted his head, expression grave. “It’s enough.”

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