Read The Fallen Sequence Online
Authors: Lauren Kate
The Fallen Sequence
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
FALLEN copyright © 2009 by Tinderbox Books, LLC and Lauren Kate
TORMENT copyright © 2010 by Tinderbox Books, LLC and Lauren Kate
PASSION copyright © 2011 by Tinderbox Books, LLC and Lauren Kate
RAPTURE copyright © 2012 by Tinderbox Books, LLC and Lauren Kate
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House LLC, New York, a Penguin Random House Company. The works in this collection were originally published separately in hardcover by Delacorte Press in 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random House LLC.
eISBN: 978-0-385-38461-2
A Delacorte Press eBook Edition
v3.1
Contents
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2009 by Tinderbox Books, LLC and Lauren Kate
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
WWW.RANDOMHOUSE.COM/TEENS
WWW.FALLENBOOKS.COM
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
eISBN: 978-0-375-89675-0
Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
v3.0
FOR MY FAMILY,
WITH GRATITUDE AND LOVE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Enormous thanks to everyone at Random House and Delacorte Press for doing so much so quickly and so well. To Wendy Loggia, whose easy generosity and enthusiasm have spurred me on from the beginning. To Krista Vitola, for a hugely helpful behind-the-scenes job. To Brenda Schildgen at UC Davis, for the background and inspiration. To Nadia Cornier, for helping get this whole thing off the ground. To Ted Malawer, for his sharp, graceful, and funny editorial guidance. To Michael Stearns, former boss-man, now trusted colleague and friend. You are, simply, a genius.
To my parents; my grandparents; Robby, Kim, and Jordan; and my new family in Arkansas. Words fail when I think of your unwavering support. I love you all.
And to Jason, who talks to me about characters as if they are real people until I can figure them out. You inspire me, you challenge me, you make me laugh every day. You have my heart.
Contents
Chapter One - Perfect Strangers
Chapter Four - Graveyard Shift
Chapter Five - The Inner Circle
Chapter Seven - Shedding Light
Chapter Eight - A Dive Too Deep
Chapter Nine - State of Innocence
Chapter Ten - Where There’s Smoke
Chapter Eleven - Rude Awakening
Chapter Thirteen - Touched at the Roots
Chapter Fifteen - The Lions’ Den
Chapter Sixteen - Hanging in the Balance
Chapter Seventeen - An Open Book
Chapter Eighteen - The Buried War
Chapter Nineteen - Out of Sight
But paradise is locked and bolted…
We must make a journey around the world
to see if a back door has perhaps been left open
.
—HEINRICH VON KLEIST,
“On the Puppet Theater”
IN THE BEGINNING
HELSTON, ENGLAND
SEPTEMBER 1854
A
round midnight, her eyes at last took shape. The look in them was feline, half determined and half tentative—all trouble. Yes, they were just right, those eyes. Rising up to her fine, elegant brow, inches from the dark cascade of her hair.
He held the paper at arm’s length to assess his progress. It was hard, working without her in front of him, but then, he never could sketch in her presence. Since he had arrived from London—no, since he had
first seen her—he’d had to be careful always to keep her at a distance.
Every day now she approached him, and every day was more difficult than the one before. It was why he was leaving in the morning—for India, for the Americas, he didn’t know or care. Wherever he ended up, it would be easier than being here.