“Like a near-death experience?” Esther asks.
Moriah shakes her head. “NDEs occur early enough to remain harmless. What I’m referring to is a phenomenon known as Killing Death.”
A hush falls over the last-years’ side of the room. Even Rafe feels stiff at Dez’s side.
“Killing Death,” Moriah says, “occurs when the film has been shownin its entirety, where the soul enters the White Light andthenstill manages to turn back.” She looks up and across the room, almost as if seeking Dez’s eyes. “Perversity corrupts the soul of a death-killer. On earth this perversity is known asevil. It means ‘being turned the wrong way.’ The death-killer’s existence is an endless struggle, and their perversity threatens the existence of everything we know. Everything there is.”
Dez watches as Yael refills her champagne from the bottle, her hand trembling as she drinks the whole flute down.
“To remain at Acheron,” the director says, “you must have a perfect record of successful films. No death-killers.”
Dr. Zarlengo steps from the shadows now to whisper something in the director’s ear. She nods, frowning, then looks back out at the crowd.
“I must also acknowledge a recent development,” Moriah says as her snake twists up and around her neck.
Dez looks at Rafe, at the quiet last-years. They seem to know already what the director’s about to say.
“The bodies that befell our campus in recent weeks were not suicides.”
Dez gasps.
“They were not even Acheron students,” Moriah says.
Dez’s fingers clench the stem of her champagne flute. Across the room, murmurs explode from the first-years.
“What about Alice?” Esther calls out.
“Alice Quinn is alive and well,” the director says. “But she was never going to make it as a filmmaker at Acheron. That became clear weeks ago when we reviewed her work. She took a nice severance package—what we call a Dream Expulsion.”
“What the devil is Dream Expulsion?” Paul Rowan asks.
“A special sleeping potion Eri concocted,” Moriah says, “fromwhich Alice awoke remembering her time at Acheron as one does a fading dream. I know you were friends, and I am sorry. It was the only way to help us hold back the truth until tonight. Until we were ready to tell you.”
“I knew it,” Dez says under her breath.
“And Charles Costella?” Simon asks.
“He was never enrolled here,” the director explains. “A stranger to us.”
“To some of us,” Rafe says so quietly Dez almost doesn’t hear it.
“What you were told previously about the fallen bodies, you were told for your own protection.”
And to keep us here,Dez thinks. Who would remain if they knew the truth? Why should they remain now?
“These poor souls, these sorrowful creatures,” Moriah says, “they are signs of a broken Heaven. A Heaven that is falling apart at the seams.”
She looks up toward the sky, through the stained-glass tree, her face marked with reverence and fear.
“Without an Angel of Death, mistakes are inevitable,” Moriah continues. “We have tried to compensate for Samael’s absence, but it’s not possible. We believe some mortals may be dying without any film in place. Without knowing one’s life as a story, one’s life has no meaning. Without meaning, one cannot pass through the Veil. And so, they fall back down to earth. But because a soul can’t touch earth without the protection of a body, they end up seeking”—she grimaces—“otherbody parts as they fall. Catch as catch can, if you will. An arm from a boneyard, a skull from a shallow grave.”
“That’s horrible.” Dez shudders, thinking of the body she saw the day of Alice Quinn’s fake memorial service.
“We call themfragmented resurrections,” Moriah says. “We are doing our best to help them. They are under our care.”
Dez shakes her head, at a loss for words.
“In closing,” Moriah says, “it is not an easy moment to enter into this work. Things are darker than they have ever been. But the future of death as we know it rests largely on you. We hope you will stay.” She pauses, stroking the tail of her white snake. “We await your decisions by dawn.”
