Chapter 43 Summary: As I Was Saying
⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.
Summary
Chapter 43 opens mid-battle. Agnus, in full werewolf form, slams into Steve and tears into his throat. The attack feels easy, and she relishes the violence—until the flesh in her mouth turns dry and gritty. Steve's body dissolves into sand and reforms, completely uninjured.
Steve taunts her, revealing he met Agnus's ancestor—the original Wagner werewolf—in 1776 and traded his clay paw print for a bottle of apricot cider. He mocks the ancestor's bargain, noting that the Wagner's pelt now hangs in a museum's natural-history section. He frames their fight as a missed chance at friendship between humanity's chosen monsters, but Agnus is beyond conversation.
Steve attacks with sand shaped into cobras. Agnus dodges, but during the fight she notices chunks of dead beetles mixed into the sand. For a split second, she glimpses Steve's true form: a grinning skull buried in writhing insects, a mummified hand waving.
Steve pushes Agnus away from the wall, leaving her floating helplessly in zero gravity. A sand-cobra rushes toward her, and she braces for impact. The pain never comes. Frank has thrown themselves between Agnus and the attack, taking a spear of sand through the chest. Frank insists it's just a scratch, but there's a hole in their chest they can't cover with a palm.
As Frank coughs blood, something inside them sparks—a flicker of electricity. Steve recoils. Agnus recognizes fear in him and seizes the moment. She springs off the railing, sinks her teeth into Steve's throat, and shoves her mechanical arm through his chest into a monitor on the wall. She twists her claw into the wiring, and a bolt of electricity hurls her back, blowing the arm off her shoulder. But Steve is pinned to the wall, his skin alight with electricity.
His disguise fails. Steve is revealed as a brittle skeleton held together by scraps of skin, rotting fabric, and hundreds of writhing beetles. The beetles begin to burn and scatter. Steve pleads for help, accusing Agnus of cheating. The last beetles fall away, and the skeleton slumps forward. Steve is dead.
Agnus shakes as the transformation reverses. She reverts to human form and checks on Frank, who is badly wounded but alive. The spider drone is battered too, with cracked camera lenses. Agnus decides they need Dr. Stew, despite her complicated history with the doctor. Frank expresses sadness that Steve didn't want to talk—they had hoped he might know something about Agnus's ancestors. But Agnus insists Steve didn't know a damn thing about her ancestors. Frank quietly agrees, adding that Steve probably didn't know anything about theirs either.
Key Events
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Agnus attacks Steve in werewolf form, but his body dissolves into sand and reforms unharmed
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Steve reveals he met the original Wagner werewolf in 1776 and traded his paw print for cider
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Agnus glimpses Steve's true form—a mummified skeleton covered in beetles—through the sand illusion
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Steve pushes Agnus into zero gravity, leaving her vulnerable
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Frank throws themselves between Agnus and a sand attack, taking a severe chest wound
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Electricity sparking inside Frank's wound reveals Steve's fear of electricity
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Agnus electrocutes Steve by shoving her mechanical arm through his chest into a monitor
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Steve's disguise collapses, revealing the beetle-bound skeleton beneath; he dies
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Agnus reverts to human form and takes Frank to Dr. Stew for help
Character Development
Agnus confronts a painful truth about her own nature. When Steve mocks the Wagner bloodline's deal with the devil, Agnus wants to defend her ancestor but realizes she can't—Oma's stories were too bright and heroic to be entirely honest. She acknowledges that there is nothing holy about werewolves, a realization she first had at thirteen. This internal reckoning adds depth to her transformation and her fight.
Frank demonstrates remarkable self-sacrifice, throwing themselves between Agnus and a lethal attack without hesitation. Their casual insistence that the wound is just a scratch underscores their loyalty and their willingness to downplay their own suffering. Their sadness that Steve didn't want to talk reveals a more reflective side—they hoped for understanding, not just victory.
Steve is unmasked as a creature of illusion. His confident, theatrical persona gives way to a desperate, crumbling skeleton held together by beetles. His fear of electricity—a vulnerability Agnus exploits—shows that even the most powerful-seeming antagonist has weaknesses.
Themes, Symbols, or Motifs
Werewolf myth deconstruction: The chapter actively dismantles the romanticized image of the werewolf. Agnus's internal admission that there's nothing holy about her kind, and Steve's mockery of the Wagner ancestor's deal, reframe the curse as a bargain for power rather than a noble sacrifice.
Illusion vs. reality: Steve's sand form is a literal illusion masking a decaying corpse. The beetles in the sand are the first crack in that illusion, and Agnus's glimpse of his true form foreshadows his eventual unmasking.
Self-sacrifice: Frank's willingness to take a fatal blow for Agnus mirrors the loyalty theme running through the book. Their sacrifice is what ultimately turns the tide, because it reveals Steve's weakness.
Exploiting weakness: Agnus wins not through brute force but by identifying and exploiting Steve's fear of electricity. The chapter rewards observation and adaptability over raw power.
Deals with the devil and immortality's futility: Steve's commentary on the Wagner ancestor's bargain—and his own fate—reinforces the idea that such deals never go as hoped. Steve's true form is a mummified skeleton, and the Wagner's pelt hangs in a museum. Both are reminders that immortality doesn't preserve what matters.
Why This Chapter Matters
This chapter delivers the long-awaited confrontation with Steve and resolves it decisively. It also deepens Agnus's understanding of her own heritage, forcing her to reconcile the heroic stories Oma told with the darker truth. Frank's injury raises the stakes for the rest of the story, and the decision to seek Dr. Stew's help sets up the next phase of the narrative. The chapter also reframes the antagonist: Steve was never a godlike figure but a desperate, decaying creature clinging to an illusion.
Study Questions
1. Why does Agnus hesitate to defend her ancestor when Steve mocks the Wagner bloodline?
Agnus wants to shout that the original Wagner cursed himself to protect people, but she knows it would be a lie. Oma's stories were too bright and heroic to be entirely honest, and Agnus has known since she was thirteen that there is nothing holy about werewolves. She can't defend a version of her ancestor she no longer believes in.
2. How does Frank's sacrifice change the course of the fight?
Frank throws themselves between Agnus and Steve's sand attack, taking a spear through the chest. The wound reveals a spark of electricity inside Frank, which causes Steve to recoil in fear. That reaction gives Agnus the information she needs to win: she exploits Steve's fear of electricity by shoving her mechanical arm through his chest into a monitor, electrocuting him and destroying his disguise.
3. What does Steve's true form reveal about the nature of his power?
Steve's power was always an illusion. Beneath the confident, theatrical exterior is a mummified skeleton held together by beetles. His immortality is hollow—he's been decaying all along, and his control over the beetles is fragile. The moment the electricity disrupts the beetles, his entire facade collapses. His power was never real; it was a performance.