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Chapters (53)
  1. Front Cover
  2. Letter from the Author
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Contents
  6. • One •
  7. • Two •
  8. • Three •
  9. • Four •
  10. • Five •
  11. • Six •
  12. • Seven •
  13. • Eight •
  14. • Nine •
  15. • Ten •
  16. • Eleven •
  17. • Twelve •
  18. • Thirteen •
  19. • Fourteen •
  20. • Fifteen •
  21. • Sixteen •
  22. • Seventeen •
  23. • Eighteen •
  24. • Nineteen •
  25. • Twenty •
  26. • Twenty-One •
  27. • Twenty-Two •
  28. • Twenty-Three •
  29. • Twenty-Four •
  30. • Twenty-Five •
  31. • Twenty-Six •
  32. • Twenty-Seven •
  33. • Twenty-Eight •
  34. • Twenty-Nine •
  35. • Thirty •
  36. • Thirty-One •
  37. • Thirty-Two •
  38. • Thirty-Three •
  39. • Thirty-Four •
  40. • Thirty-Five •
  41. • Thirty-Six •
  42. • Thirty-Seven •
  43. • Thirty-Eight •
  44. • ∞ •
  45. • Thirty-Nine •
  46. • Forty •
  47. Epilogue
  48. Acknowledgments
  49. Excerpt from Be Dazzled
  50. One
  51. Two
  52. About the Author
  53. Back Cover

“Relax,” said Sophia as she reemerged. She swung a long cape over her shoulders. “One of your own kind can set you free after we ditch you, but mark my words: this is the freest you’re ever going to get. Enjoy it, Ms. Van Demure.”

There was tension between Adeline and Sophia. The privileged girl paired with the renegade rebel. The bookworm in him told him that this was a relationship that would last the plot.

Wait. For the first time, Kane perceived the blue lightning that arced between Adeline and Sophia.

Wait.

“You’ll fail,” Adeline said, a clever move because it launched Sophia into some much-needed monologuing.

“Denounce me if you must.” Sophia’s cape swept her ankles as she closed in on Adeline. “But never forget that I am fighting for your freedom, Noble Girl. For everyone’s freedom. What they teach us in schools is a lie. There are centuries of history that they’ve erased. History in which women gained the right to be more than just political servants. History in which there was no Underclass and no Committee controlling everything. Don’t you see? The city of Everest is a lie. Holy Society is a lie, dreamed up by the Committee to control us. But you’re at the top, so why would you question it? I suppose obliviousness is how the elite must tolerate themselves.”

Adeline set her jaw. Kane thought she was an expert actor in this moment. Her voice dripped with incredulity. “How can you be so sure?”

Sophia chuckled, wagging her white-gloved fingers. “Look, and you will find. Those of us who follow the Bright Hand have been collecting artifacts for years. The heists never make the news, but I assure you our archives have been growing, and they reveal a history of glorious blasphemy.” She leaned even closer. “You think the year is 1961, don’t you? It’s not. It’s the year 2123. I know, because that”—she thrust a hand at the pill packet Kane held—“is from 2009. It’s a type of pill that stops the Mothering. Did you even know that was a choice?”

Adeline feigned disbelief about the concept of birth control, and Sophia’s face split into a gloating grin. She snatched the pills from Kane and kept her eyes locked with Adeline’s as she stowed the artifact back in Adeline’s girdle.

“Move it, rich bitch,” she commanded, leading them from the tower, down into the future’s city of Everest.

• Thirty •

Pretty

The city of Everest was dead.

It was a public death that emanated from everything. Dark windows shown straight through empty buildings to the other side of the block. Vacant streets stretched, empty under fluorescent lights that collected no moths. Strangest of all, there was no trash. Life, even its litter, had been scoured away.