Everneath The Supernatural Quotes

The way Cole describes the Elysian Fields, a.k.a. the part of Everneath that's not the freaky Tunnels, he makes it sound pretty darn appealing. In fact, maybe it sounds too appealing. After all, it's only available to people who kind of sell their souls and need to feed off the life energy of others. Creepy much?

Here, Nikki is watching a person fall from our world into the Tunnels of the Everneath. It's pretty bizarre to watch. Like, Nikki knows that the Tunnels exist, but she hasn't necessarily witnessed the transition between worlds before. And even if you know that there's supernatural stuff out there, it's one thing to know it, and another thing to see it with your own eyes.

Even though it's a weird supernatural place, the Everneath still works by a system of rules. In this case, as Cole tells Nikki, humans can only get there via certain routes. They need to have an Everliving accompany them, which can be done by literally going with them, or by ingesting some part of their body (like one of Cole's or Maxwell's hairs). Ew.

Some really bizarre stuff goes down at the Christmas Dance when Cole's song leaks out into the audience and causes fights to erupt. As he explains to Nikki afterward, Everlivings work a little differently than humans in that the pain of a broken heart for them can touch the people around them. Eek.

When Nikki finally comes clean to Jack about the Everneath, he asks for proof. So she shows him what she can do, busting out her yummy-emotion-sucking trick. And he freaks out. We can't blame Jack for being spooked about the supernatural stuff he's learning about, but it seems hard on Nikki, too. No one likes to be asked what they are, as a general rule.

According to Nikki, there's a somewhat rational explanation for why it feels like Everlivings are eating your emotions. But it's still something we consider supernatural, because Cole and his kind walk and talk like humans, but need our electrical energy to survive. That's pretty unnatural-seeming. We bet there's more to the story, though.

This scene takes the cake for creepy supernatural stuff that happens to Nikki. It's bad enough that she has to see an unnatural funnel cloud appear out of nowhere and have no effect on the surrounding environment—she also has to experience her mark from the Tunnels actually changing shape on her arm. Ugh.

It's funny to listen to Professor Spears talk about the Everliving from such a distant, academic perspective. We're thinking he doesn't necessarily believe that they exist, but he can list what other scholars think of the phenomenon. It's pretty wild to consider, though, that there's scholarship about the myths of soul-stealing from ancient Egypt.

When the Tunnels finally come for Nikki, Jack is there with her. He asks her to consider going with Cole if it'll save her an eternity of suffering, but she refuses, saying she doesn't want to sell her soul because she might miss out on seeing Jack in the afterlife. It sounds like she's not really sure about how any of this stuff works, but she wants to play it safe now that Jack's a priority in her life again.

At the book's end, Jack has disappeared into the Tunnels, and Nikki is super bummed about it. But because of the emotional connection they share, Jack visits her every night. Is he a ghostly visitation? Is he a dream? Is he a spiritual sending? It's kind of unclear what exactly is going on here, but we get the sense that Nikki's attachment to Jack is helping him stay alive in the Tunnels. And that is definitely a good thing.