Chapter 40 Summary, Analysis, and Key Takeaways
⚠️ 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
Rafal flies south and lands in Akgul at half past midnight, arriving just as the kingdom's nightly festivities reach their peak. Akgul is a city built on leisure: its citizens sleep by day and party by night, freed from ordinary labor because diamond mines beneath the kingdom fund a life of play. As Rafal wanders the crowded alleyways of pubs and inns, he observes humans, ogres, and other creatures stumbling about in celebration. He reflects that this endless party—an embrace of pleasure without guilt—is what Good would call the epitome of Evil, yet he privately wonders whether such a life might be the purest one of all.
Rafal is not here to join the party. He has come to recruit a new student for his class: a young Never who could salvage his treacherous class and lead it, someone who understands loyalty and commitment. He briefly considers James Hook, remembering that the boy had offered him a place on his ship to Neverland. Rafal muses that Hook would whip his classmates into shape and could serve as a loyal henchman, though it would breach the agreement between Rafal and the Pirate Captain about poaching students. But Rafal dismisses the idea: Hook believes he is Good. Rafal scoffs at the irony—a boy who begged an Evil School Master to breathe his soul into him still imagines himself in ties and tails at an Evers' Ball. Souls who believe themselves Good, Rafal reasons, would not last in the School for Evil. He sighs and presses on, though he admits to himself that he misses the boy.
Rafal reaches the Black Rabbit, a venue hidden behind a heavy stone door camouflaged into the alley wall. A goblin outside holds a bucket of glowing green bands, the signature entry marker for the club. Inside, a band called the Gruff Gruff Goats performs on a high stage, and a hundred teenagers stomp and dance beneath them, wearing the green glow bands. But Rafal is interested in the price of entry: each patron must surrender a written Evil confession on a tiny green parchment scroll. He approaches the bar, where a dark-haired woman in neon green lipstick—Divya, the bartender—is counting the scrolls. Teenagers order Snake Venoms, a bright green tonic made of starfruit, anise, and kola nut that fuels dancing until sunrise. Rafal notices a hooded figure slouched at the far end of the bar.
Rafal asks Divya if there are any good confessions tonight. She doesn't look up, remarking that he must be desperate to return, since she already gave him their best before Kidnapping Night. She complains that most patrons toss off uncreative confessions—lying to their mother, smacking their sister, or wetting the bed out of laziness—and holds up one scroll that reads about tipping Daddy's cow. She tells Rafal that the Black Rabbit's most Evil souls have already been taken for his school, leaving only the runts of the litter.
Divya then presses Rafal about Evil's losing streak. She says the lot of them keep hoping it will turn around, that Evil will get a winning run to balance things out—that it's the Storian's job. But the look on Rafal's face makes her think they have it all wrong. Rafal assures her Evil will win again soon, and this is true: he has returned to Rhian's side, taken a death blow for his brother, and proven his love. The Pen should reward Evil and restore the balance. The Saders promised him this when he freed them from prison. Indeed, the tale being written at this very moment might be the one that turns the tide. But Rafal is still down a student, and he is on a determined mission to find one he can trust.
He puts his hands on the bar and asks Divya not to let him leave without a name—someone in these Woods who can make Evil proud. A voice interrupts: