“You’re looking for sticks, the thicker the better,” she said, snapping the twig in half and handing each of us a burlap bag. “Meet me back here in two hours. And don’t be late, or you’ll be in the woods after dark. I’ll be waiting by the entrance. If you need help, just holler.” With that, she waddled back to the guard’s hut by the gate.
I turned to Dante, wondering if he was angry, if he would forgive me. I tried to think of a way to apologize, but before I could say anything, he looked away and ventured into the woods, leaving me alone. Stung by his coldness, I waited until he was a few paces ahead, then headed through the trees in the opposite direction.
The ground was covered in snow, which I sunk in up to my shins. The oaks were naked, their branches sticking into the sky like fingers. Oddly shaped mushrooms clung to the trunks, creating yellow staircases that spiraled up the bark. Taking giant strides, I walked into the confusing maze that made up the forest.
“You’re going the wrong way,” Dante called out to me.
“We’re picking up sticks. There is no wrong way.”
Shaking his head, he changed his course to my direction. Suddenly, an odd whiteness peeked through the trees. I walked toward it. As I approached, the number of trees diminished until there were barely any. It wasn’t until I was standing directly in front of it that I realized that it wasn’t a clearing. It was the Dead Forest.
I stopped at its outskirts. The landscape was vast and desolate, the snow peppered with splintered wood. The trees were white, and had no branches or leaves. They littered the horizon like toothpicks. Decaying stumps stood beside them, their bark charred a permanent black.
“The Dead Forest,” Dante said beside me, staring out into the abyss of trees. “I knew you were going the wrong way.”
“What are you talking about? This place is full of wood.”
“It’s all rotten,” he said. We exchanged an uncomfortable look before I trudged forward.
“So it’s true,” I said softly, my nose running as I stopped beneath the trunk of a tree that leaned tenuously over the ground like the lip of a bridge.
Dante stepped closer. “That I could hurt you?”
He took another step. “That I would never hurt you?”
Everything was silent except for the hollow echo of the wind. “Yes,” he said.
My hair blew around my face in the wind. “That you feel sensation around all humans?” I asked.
He reached out to touch my face, but let his hand hover just inches away. “No. Only you.”
I let out a breath, unsure of whether or not I should believe him. “That you’re dead?”
Dante ran his hand up my back, so gently it could have been the wind.
“The paper cut. The séance. The night in Attica Falls. It’s all true?”
“Yes.”
My lips trembled as I turned to him, my eyes searching the familiar contours of his face for some sign of death. “Show me.”
Suddenly, I heard a crack, and with the full force of gravity, the dead tree above me began to fall. Underneath it, a nest of moths burst out of a hole in the trunk and flapped around me. I screamed and fell into the snow.
It all happened quickly. With inhuman strength, Dante caught the tree before it crushed my body. With two hands, he lifted the trunk as if it were weightless and threw it to the ground. And in no time he was beside me, cradling me in his arms.
I stared at his face in disbelief.
“When we reanimate, we’re born into the best version of ourselves,” he explained. “The strongest. The smartest. The most beautiful. Whatever your best qualities were when you were alive, those would be augmented.”
“Why me?” I said. “Why did you keep calling me? Keep waiting for me?”
“I couldn’t help it. I had to see you,” he said. “I know my situation is...unusual, but it doesn’t change how I feel about you.”
When I finally spoke, my voice was so small I could barely hear it. “How do you feel about me?”
Dante took a step closer. “I miss you.” He spoke gently, his words delicate, as if he wasn’t ready to part with them yet. “I miss everything about you. Your laugh, your voice. The way I never know what you’re going to say next. It’s like the entire world is dead, and you’re the only one living....” His voice trailed off; he seemed embarrassed to have said so much. “I’m sorry if I scared you. I just want you to know that. That I’m sorry. For everything.”
I didn’t want to blink, didn’t want to close my eyes for a minute. I raised my hand and touched his cheek, feeling the coldness of his skin for what seemed like the first time. He smelled like earth, like pine and grass and soil.
“I’m not afraid,” I said. “I’m not afraid of you.”
“I am,” he said, closing his eyes.
And just like that, he became human again.
CHAPTER 15
Tragedy in the Mountains
WITH EVERYTHING AROUND ME BLURRING into confusion, nothing else was certain except this: I was alive. Dante was not.
The rest was speculation, and this is what I pieced together. Cassandra Millet and Benjamin Gallow were in love. Benjamin was a Plebeian, Cassandra Undead. They went to the forest. Cassandra slipped and kissed him. She couldn’t control herself, and he died. She left him in the woods. That’s what I told Dante after dinner. We were in the library, not studying.
“She told you, and you went and found him. Am I right?”
Dante nodded. “Cassandra came to us after she had accidentally killed Benjamin to ask us what she should do. I told her to turn herself in. When she didn’t, I went and found Benjamin myself. Gideon told her to leave Gottfried; disappear forever. After that, it’s mostly speculation, though your theory sounds right. Cassandra disappeared, which makes sense, considering Gideon suggested it, but we all knew that Cassandra would never have just left without saying good-bye. We argued about it, Gideon, Vivian, Yago, and I. We knew something was wrong, and Minnie’s story led us to consider the possibility that she was dead.”
“What was the fight about?”
“Gideon didn’t want me to search for Benjamin. He didn’t agree with the counsel I gave Cassandra. But after seeing what she was capable of doing to someone she loved, I was afraid of myself. That’s why I moved off campus. To protect the school from me.”