Chapter 43

Alex plunges expecting clutching hands but instead surfaces in warm, metallic-smelling water. She swims ashore, realizes she has been in a sea of blood, and the scene collapses into a vivid return to her old apartment—groceries in hand, noise and smoke heavy, the life she hated pressing in.

In that memory, Alex discovers Babbit Rabbit’s torn body, killed after her roommates let the dog Loki “play.” Unheard and unheeded, she collects the remains, drives to Mulholland, grieves alone, and buries the rabbit, condemning herself for having brought something good into a place it couldn’t survive. She dissociates, floating above the city in a numb, untethered drift.

The vision shifts to an autumn-bright green that resolves into an idealized Yale. Alex recognizes Dawes, Turner, and Darlington approaching in transformed pilgrim garb; Tripp is gone. They move toward a gleaming palace where joy feels abundant, and Darlington warns that demons feed on joy as well as pain.

Anselm emerges, first as a crowned, rabbit-headed giant, then as a polished human. He presents three yoked, emaciated figures—Carmichael, Blake, and Hellie—now demons on his leash. Anselm declares they will starve unless they can feed on suffering or pass through the portal to hunt again, but he offers a price: Daniel Arlington’s soul, “rightfully” claimed by hell.

Darlington offers himself; Turner urges negotiation; Dawes refuses to leave anyone. Anselm taunts Alex, saying she regrets the rabbit more than the men she killed, and reveals the Gauntlet was constructed to summon the Wheelwalker—Alex—and that he only understood her nature when she carried Darlington’s soul. Turner confirms Anselm speaks truth. Anselm hints that previous pilgrims reached this place and struck a bargain, explaining why the Gauntlet’s history was erased.