"My plan: Get into the city. Get Nadia. Find a way out. Simple." A week ago, seventeen-year-old Lela Santos�s best friend, Nadia, killed herself. Today, thanks to a farewell ritual gone awry, Lela is standing in paradise, looking upon a vast gated city in the distance � hell. No one willingly walks through the Suicide Gates, into a place smothered in darkness and infested with depraved creatures. But Lela isn�t just anyone � she�s determined to save her best friend�s soul, even if it means sacrificing her eternal afterlife. As Lela struggles to find Nadia, she�s captured by the Guards, enormous, not-quite-human creatures that patrol the dark city�s endless streets. Their all-too human leader, Malachi, is unlike them in every way except one: his deadly efficiency. When he meets Lela, Malachi forms his own plan: get her out of the city, even if it means she must leave Nadia behind. Malachi knows something Lela doesn�t � the dark city isn�t the worst place Lela could end up, and he will stop at nothing to keep her from that fate.