Chapters (54)
- Cover
- EVERWILD
- Dedication
- Acknowledgments
- Copyright Page
- PART ONEA Vapor of Afterlights
- CHAPTER 1Fresh Havoc
- CHAPTER 2The View on High
- CHAPTER 3Audience with an Ogre
- CHAPTER 4The Outcast
- CHAPTER 5Southern Discomfort
- CHAPTER 6Shuttle Diplomacy
- CHAPTER 7A Fistful of Forever
- PART TWODancing with the Deadlies
- CHAPTER 8Treasures of the Flesh
- CHAPTER 9Good Stewards
- CHAPTER 10Skinjacking for Fun and Profit
- CHAPTER 11Surfing Tennessee
- CHAPTER 12Of Monsters and Mullets
- CHAPTER 13Bye-bye, Miss American Pie
- CHAPTER 14Strange Winds
- CHAPTER 15The Flight of Mikey McGill
- PART THREEThe Great White City
- CHAPTER 16Mary’s Master Plan
- CHAPTER 17The Death Boss
- CHAPTER 18The Interlight Incubator
- CHAPTER 19Eminence Green
- PART FOURWay of the Chocolate Warrior
- CHAPTER 20The Great Train Robbery
- CHAPTER 21Let ’Er Rip
- CHAPTER 22Cram That Sucker
- CHAPTER 23Severance and Blithe
- CHAPTER 24It’s a Dog’s Life
- PART FIVEThe Skinjacker Revelations
- CHAPTER 25Lair of the Cat Woman
- CHAPTER 26Home
- CHAPTER 27Skinjacker’s Lullaby
- CHAPTER 28The Sleep of the Dead
- CHAPTER 29Teed for Two
- CHAPTER 30A Place on the Mantel
- PART SIXCity of the Dead
- CHAPTER 31On the Banks of Eternity
- CHAPTER 32The Low Approach
- CHAPTER 33Suspicious Minds
- CHAPTER 34Poolside Rendezvous
- CHAPTER 35Allie-Allie-Oxen-Free
- CHAPTER 36The Intolerable Nexus of Extremes
- CHAPTER 37Sky Refugees
- CHAPTER 38Last Train Out of Memphis
- CHAPTER 39At the Moment of Madness
- CHAPTER 40The Changeling and the Golem
- EPILOGUERequiem for the Living
- Unwind excerpt
- Unwholly excerpt
Spiked armor encased him now, his whole body was like the surface of a medieval mace—but it didn’t slow him down. His armored shell thundered with each footfall, setting off seismic ripples in the living world that no one could account for. And, fully encased in that armored exoskeleton, he stormed all the way back to Nashville, right into the factory, and the den of Nashville Afterlights.
When they saw this thing, this horrible miscreation before them, they didn’t know what to do. Some scattered, others froze in place, others fell to the ground and covered their heads like the world was ending.
Mikey opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead, he vomited his entire being out through that gaping mouth, completely turning himself inside out. The armor folded in behind him, and into him, becoming a jagged skeleton within a veiny, sinewy inner self—a mockery of ruined flesh. His whole body was now an open wound.
“I am the McGill!” he roared in a ghastly, earthshaking voice. “I am the McGill! Look upon me and tremble!”
And they did.
PART THREE
The Great White City
| In her book Everything Mary Says Is Wrong, Allie the Outcast takes a moment to ponder the hereafter: |
| “I don’t know whether we come to Everlost by accident or by design. Some will say we are abandoned here—lost between the cracks of an unfeeling universe. Others will say we have been selected to be here by an almighty hand, and then they will use that to justify everything they do as God’s will. |
| Whether my ability to skinjack is an accident or intentional, I do know this: I’ve seen the light at the end of the tunnel, so I know the universe is not cold. I’ve read the fortunes; they are evidence that we are not alone. And I’ve seen Afterlights hold their coins, remember who they once were, and finally get where they were going. |
| I have seen enough to know that there is something beyond Everlost, but the nature of it is just as mysterious here as it is to the living. |
| So beware those in Everlost who say they know God’s will, because they are no different from those who say the universe is soulless and cold. Both are two sides of the same coin, and it’s not a coin that will get you anywhere you want to go.” |
CHAPTER 16
Mary’s Master Plan
It would be untrue to say that Mary Hightower had, from the very beginning, planned the various things she would soon accomplish, and the many things she would soon attempt. Ideas take root, plans blossom, and old ones wither and die—in Everlost, just as in the living world.