“Lorien isn’t dead; it’s hibernating. You said so yourself. And the point is, we’re not dead.”

She swallows hard. “A death sentence has been handed down to us all,” she says, and her voice slightly cracks. Then, in a much softer tone, she says, “Our lives were doomed from the beginning. We should do good while we’re here, so we may have a good afterlife.”

“How can you say that?”

“Because that’s the reality. We’re the last of a dying race, and soon we’ll be gone, too. And may God help us when that time comes.”

I shake my head at her. I have no interest in talking about God.

“Where is my Chest? In this room?” I walk around the room, casting my gaze along the ceiling’s edges, and then I crouch and peer beneath a few of the beds.

“Even if you had it, you can’t open it without me,” she says. “You know that.”

She’s right. If I’m to believe what she’d told me years before, when I could still trust the things she said, then I can’t open it without her. The futility of it hits me all at once. The boot prints in the snow; John Smith on the run; the sheer and utter claustrophobia of Santa Teresa; and Adelina, my Cêpan, meant to help and assist in developing my Legacies, who has given up on our mission. She doesn’t even know what Legacies of mine have developed. I have the ability to see in the dark, breathe underwater, to run at superspeeds; to move things with my mind; and the means to bring plants back from the brink of death. Anxiety sweeps over me, and at the worst possible moment, Sister Dora enters the room. She props her fists on her hips.

“Why aren’t you in the kitchen?”

I look at her and mirror the same scowl she’s giving me.

“Oh, shut up,” I say, and march out of the room before she responds. I run down the hall, down the stairs, grab my coat again and push through the double doors.

I look wildly around as I move within the shadows lining the side of the road. Though I still feel as though I’m being watched, outside nothing seems amiss. I race down the hill without letting my guard down, and when I reach the café, I enter because it’s the only place open. About half of its twenty tables are occupied, which I’m thankful for; I have the urge to be surrounded by people. I’m about to sit when I notice Héctor, alone in the corner, drinking wine.

“Why aren’t you at El Festín?”