Page 19

I jolted awake to the shriek of alarms, stained-glass light slicing the room in jagged bands of molten orange.

My fingers scrambled for my slate, the sound relentless and shrill, a blade carving through my half-conscious thoughts.

There were no buttons, no obvious way to silence it.

Just the ceaseless, mechanical wail, pressing hard against my skull.

I let out a scream of frustration and sent it skidding across the floor. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes.

“Get up.” Rosaline’s voice was clipped as she tossed my school sweater toward me. The buttons hit my chest with enough force to sting. “Up!”

I rubbed my face, blinking. It was almost seven in the morning. I’d planned to tell Verrine in the head office instead of going to breakfast. There was no time for that now.

“What’s going on?” I asked, but I obliged her as I quickly pulled on my gray pleated skirt and made quick work of the buttons on my shirt.

“There’s been a breach.” Her voice was eerily calm. “Chapel. Thirty seconds. Move.”

“What do you mean a breach?” A tugging sensation pulled at my heart as I lifted my heel and toed into my pumps. My mind started to wake up slowly.

This couldn’t be about the playing cards right?

My actions were irreversible, but it was still my choice whether I took the blame or not.

I tried to console myself as we walked wordlessly downstairs, milling down the corridors along with the crowds of Upper and Lower Sixth as the alarms climbed to a fever pitch.

The chapel was a mausoleum, cold, airless and thick with the scent of rotting lilies and candle smoke. Vaulted ceilings loomed overhead, vanishing into shadow, but the walls felt like they were closing in. I struggled to breathe as we were herded into rows, separated by our houses.

My heart was in my throat. I hadn’t expected this.

The Lower Sixth students were forced to the front, while the Upper Sixth could take the higher, farther back pews concealed from the prying eyes of professors.

Verrine’s violet-stained lips twisted as she watched from her podium, deepening the cruel creases carved into her face.

Behind her was a vast construct of glass and metal and something more, something alive.

Hourglasses stacked upon hourglasses, spinning, shifting, twisting in midair as though gravity had no dominion over them.

Tendrils of molten gold and abyssal black coiled between the chambers, light and dark, honey and shadow, twisting like a heartbeat trapped in glass. It held my gaze captive.

“The Crucible,” someone whispered beside me. Lilibeth sat to my left, her hands pressed together as if in silent prayer. Her uniform was immaculate, her spine a rod of iron. She didn’t turn to me as she spoke. “It’s the thing that tracks our ether score. The judge. ”

I blinked, the magic tendrils within the hourglasses rippling, twisting into spirals before shattering apart and reforming again. The judge.

“Isn’t it magical,” Lilibeth murmured. “Every choice you make is measured. Tallied. Balanced. It’s perfect.”

“ What is balanced? Ether?” My voice came quieter than I meant. She didn’t answer. Instead, Lilibeth bowed her head, hands pressed firmly together.

My slate beeped, something new etching into its surface. It was a scoreboard of every student in the Lower Sixth, clearly only visible in chapel when we were close to the Crucible. My score still read negative seven, but the number was flickering, threatening to drop.

Across the room, a girl let out a squeal of excitement as gold wove through the Crucible.

“Lucky for Mirelle Sommers,” Lilibeth said under her breath.

“She spent all of yesterday morning helping one of the younger students during sparring, so I guess it’s well-deserved.

Sometimes the Crucible rewards you hours later.

Sometimes it punishes you the second you slip up.

It’s so mercurial I can’t seem to figure it out. ”

I glanced down at the scoreboard on my slate. Mirelle Sommers’ score was ticking higher in real time, creeping up toward the thousands. Lilibeth’s score was lower than I’d expected. Ninety-eight. If her father was truly an Archangel, that had to hurt.

Verrine was tapping avidly at her slate, not taking notice, as the students’ chatter died. The Crucible flashed so brightly I raised an elbow to shield my eyes. When it faded, the room looked down at their slates in unison.

Mirelle’s score had dropped nearly a hundred points.

Her expression barely had time to register shock before the number sank further.

Her score had plummeted . I turned, searching the room, waiting for someone to react, but no one did.

I watched as Mirelle’s hands shook violently, her lashes fluttering as if trying to convince herself she’d imagined it.

If the Crucible could turn that fast on someone like Mirelle, what chance did I have?

Across the room, Dorian let out a quiet, bitter laugh. His score had advanced against his best efforts, from -403 to -300 flat. Falls count down , Ascents count up . So Dorian’s rise toward zero was a setback, as far as I understood. Drinking my blood hadn’t helped him.

Verrine raised her hand, and the chatter ceased. “As you may have noticed, this will not be our usual Wednesday morning service.”

My eyes caught on the House of Thrones opposite me, Dante’s house. I couldn’t spot him in the crowd.

“The entrance to Elsewhere has been breached,” Verrine spoke.

Her hooked nose was upturned as she surveyed us down the beak of it.

The words sent a shudder through the chapel.

Behind me, someone let out a breath. “As you know, Evermore was built to protect the two ancient pathways that connect the Common World to the afterlives. One to the After, one to Elsewhere. We have sealed the breach, but the damage is done. A student is missing, and so is something very valuable. The Arcana Deck.” Verrine’s voice echoed off the chapel walls.

“If you have any information, I urge you to step forward. Now.”

“Step forward ,” the Thread echoed, urging me to stand.

I could tell them. I could stand up, walk to the front, and confess everything .

How I’d taken the cards, how Dante had set me up, how I hadn’t known what I was getting into.

They had no choice but to expel me. My fingers curled into my skirt. Do it. Just say it.

“Please,” Verrine continued. “Don’t be afraid.

We need information. If you have any idea who might have done this, please stand.

Evermore has a zero tolerance policy. The culpable student will face expulsion.

This means we will hold an immediate graduation based on their present score.

The Rift will decide their ultimate fate. ”

What? That couldn’t be right. Had he always meant to vanish? Did he plan this the whole time? No. No—he couldn’t have. But deep down, I knew he had.

I thought that expulsion meant I would be kicked out of Evermore, let go, allowed to return home. Graduation was different. If I understood correctly, I’d have to face the thing they called the Rift. With a score like mine, where it currently sat and drifting ever lower…

I shuddered. I didn’t want to graduate. I didn’t want to be sent to either of the afterlives. I couldn’t confess, not now. It wasn’t fair. He knew I was desperate, and he used that.

Verrine’s eyes drifted toward me. I went still. A slow panic wrapped around me, squeezing the air from my lungs. I clenched my fists, forcing my breathing to stay even, my expression blank. I exhaled, swallowing down the confession that had nearly clawed its way up my throat.

This was deliberate. Dante had used me as a pawn, leveraged my desperation and ignorance, to make his escape. And I let him .

Maybe if I told her it was Dante, she’d let me go. I gritted my teeth and forced my hands to relax. I wasn’t gambling my life on the hope that Verrine would be merciful. Not yet.

Further down the pew, Ruby chewed on her lip, watching the Crucible flicker again. “Who do you think did it?” she whispered, craning her neck.

I forced my shoulders into a shrug. “No clue.” The lie tasted bitter on my tongue.

Ruby shifted uneasily. “I just…can’t imagine anything worse than this. Graduating alone? And after stealing something so powerful? It’s a true death sentence. ”

“Might not be,” I whispered back as Verrine continued speaking. “What if it was an accident?”

“No way,” Ruby shook her head. “This is bad. And whoever is missing… they breached Elsewhere. You can’t just do that, you know? Only the dead can enter the afterlives.”

The words sent a cold shudder down my spine. I pressed my nails into my palms. I froze. If he was gone, really gone, then what did that make him?

“Only the dead?” I swallowed. Dante wasn’t dead, was he? He was in Lower Sixth, he hadn’t graduated. Hadn’t even been marked.

And yet, he was gone. Ruby tilted her head. “It had to be an Upper Sixth,” she concluded. “That makes more sense, doesn’t it? Someone marked. Someone powerful. No way someone in our year pulled this off.”

I nodded, keeping my head forward. If I agreed too quickly, she’d notice. If I hesitated, she’d notice. The last thing I needed was Ruby digging too deep. She sighed, pressing her hands together.

“Saints, can you imagine?” Lilibeth murmured. “One second you’re here, the next…” She trailed off, shaking her head. “You’re just gone. Like you never existed.”

Gone. I swallowed hard. I should have known better.

The next hour was a nightmare of strangled hymns and Godwin’s monotone sermon about integrity.

I didn’t hear a word of it. The whole time, my thoughts twisted as I watched dark ribbons spiral through the belly of the Crucible.

Judgement was coming for me, whether I confessed or not. I could feel it.

I didn’t know how I was going to survive in any sense of the word.