But one it was rejected, should'nt it just be dead-lettered and never have a chance to be rejected again?

Yes, typically rejected messages are dead-lettered and will not be processed again by the same queue or topic subscription. However, it is possible that the message may be sent back to the queue or topic subscription if there is an error in processing or if the message is not acknowledged by the consumer. In such cases, it is important to make sure that the root cause of the issue is identified and fixed to prevent the message from being rejected again. Additionally, it is recommended to have appropriate error handling mechanisms in place to handle rejected messages and prevent them from causing further processing issues.