In the morning light, her scarlet gown with its beaded neckline of onyx and carmine looked garish. Blood-soaked, even. It felt like necessary armor for what awaited her in Hotel L’Eden.
Laila had not seen Séverin since he’d entered her room without permission and read a letter not meant for him. How different would her life be if he’d never found it? If she’d never written it?
At the time, she had not known how to reconcile how she felt about Tristan. She mourned the violence of his death as much as she mourned the hidden darkness in his life. His secret felt too huge to bear alone, and so she had written to her lost friend, informing him of what she’d found and how she still loved him. It was something she did from time to time—address those who couldn’t answer, and hope that it granted her some peace.
She’d only left her suite for a few minutes, and when she returned, her heart jolted at the sight of Séverin. But then her gaze had fallen to the letter in his clenched hand, the bloodless white of his knuckles, his eyes black as a hellscape, unearthly and huge in their shock.
“How long did you think you could hide this from me?”
“Séverin—”
“I let this happen to him,” he’d murmured.
“No, you didn’t,” she’d said, stepping toward him. “How could you have known? He kept it from all of us—”
But he recoiled from her, his hands shaking.
“Majnun,” she’d said, her voice breaking on the name she hadn’t uttered in months. “Don’t let this ghost haunt you. He is at rest, free of his demons. You can do the same and still live.”
Laila grabbed his wrist, where her fingers brushed against the oath bracelet. She’d extracted his promise on the night of his birthday. That night, she’d wanted him to take her on as his mistress so she could track his progress in finding The Divine Lyrics. But there was another reason too. She wanted him to want something more than numbness … and she thought, for a moment, that it could be her. She hadn’t forgotten the cruel words he’d uttered, but she could forgive cruelty stemming from guilt as long as he could forgive himself.
“Choose life,” she’d begged.
Choose me.
He looked at her. Through her. Laila could not bear to watch him retreat into himself, and so she’d grabbed his face, turning it toward her.
“You cannot protect everyone from everything,” she said. “You’re only human, Séverin.”
Something had kindled in his eyes at that. Hope flickered inside her, only for it to dim as he pulled back. Without a word, he left her room. The last she’d heard, he had thrown himself back into the search for The Divine Lyrics, as if by finding it, he might avenge Tristan and absolve himself of the guilt that he had lived while his brother had died.
Laila pulled her coat tighter around her. Her garnet ring caught the light. She had asked Zofia to make it for her not long ago. The stone looked violent and wet, as if it were not a jewel at all, but a bird’s ripped-out heart set in gold. In its face read the number 21. Twenty-one days to live.
Today was the first time she let herself doubt that number.
Until now, she’d made peace with small dreams … more afternoons with Zofia, Hypnos, and Enrique. Perhaps one last winter evening where fresh snow sugared the streets of Paris and her breath plumed gently before her. Sometimes, she imagined it looked like death, as if she were watching her own soul unspool from her lungs. She could tell herself that yes, death was cold, but at least it didn’t hurt.
Séverin’s letter changed everything.
The Order had hired them to find the Fallen House’s treasures, but to do that required finding the Sleeping Palace … and it had thwarted all attempts at discovery. Once Séverin’s steady stream of reports dried up, the Order said they would find the Fallen House’s treasure on their own. There would be no Winter Conclave for her or the others, and the only relief was that she would no longer have to play Séverin’s mistress.
Now, it seemed, she would.
Slowly, Laila became aware of a sound following her. The steady clip-clop of hooves. She stopped, turning slowly as an indigo carriage ornamented in chased silver stopped a mere five feet from her. A familiar symbol—a wide crescent moon like a sly grin—gleamed on the carriage door as it swung open.
“I’m hurt you didn’t invite me on your adventure last night,” pouted a familiar voice.
Hypnos leaned through the open door and blew her a kiss. Laila smiled, caught the kiss, and made her way to him.
“The bed was too small,” she said.
“I hope its owner wasn’t,” he said. From his jacket, he pulled out a letter with Séverin’s seal. “I imagine you were also summoned.”
Laila answered by holding up her own letter. Hypnos grinned, then made room for her in the carriage.
“Ride with me, ma chère. There’s no time to waste.”
A pang dug into Laila’s chest.
“How well I know it,” she said, and stepped into the carriage.
3
ENRIQUE
For the fifth time in the past minute, Enrique Mercado-Lopez smoothed his hair and patted his immaculate shirtfront. Then, he cleared his throat. “Gentlemen of the Ilustrados, I thank you for joining me today for my presentation on ancient world powers. For this afternoon, I have assembled a selection of Forged artifacts from around the globe. I believe that as we advance the sovereignty of the Philippines, we should look for guidance in history. Our past can reshape our future!”
He paused, blinking. Then he muttered, “Wait, our past … or the past?”
He looked down at his notepad where he’d crossed and recrossed, underlined and blotted out nearly half of his original presentation that had taken weeks to prepare.
“The past,” he said, making another note.
He looked out over the reading room of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. It was one of the most beautiful libraries he had ever seen, the ceilings vaulted like the rib cage of a slain monster out of myth, and full of stained glass windows, book-lined walls, and Forged reference books that perched on slender golden racks, preening and flapping their covers.
It was also completely empty.
Enrique glanced at the center of the room. In place of a chandelier rotated a great, glowing orb displaying the time: half past eleven.
The Ilustrados were late. Too late. The meeting was to start at ten. Perhaps they had gotten the time wrong. Or had they lost the invitations? No, that couldn’t be it. He’d double-checked the addresses and confirmed their receipt. They wouldn’t ignore him like this … would they? Surely, he had proven his worth as a curator and historian. He’d written articles for La Solidaridad and eloquently—or so he thought—argued his case for the equality of colonized civilizations to its colonizers. Besides, he had the backing of Hypnos, a patriarch in the Order of Babel and Séverin Montagnet-Alarie, Paris’s most influential investor and owner of the grandest hotel in France.
Enrique put down his notebook and stepped from his podium to the dining table arranged in the middle of the room and set for the nine members of the Ilustrados inner circle … soon to be ten. He hoped. The hot ginger salabat tea had begun to cool. Soon, he’d have to cover up the afritada and pancit on their heating platters. The bucket holding champagne was more water than ice.