Enrique looked at the spread. Perhaps it would not have been so bad if non-Ilustrados members had come. He thought about Hypnos, and warmth pleasantly curled through his body. He’d wanted to invite him, but the other boy tended to balk at any sign of too much commitment and preferred their casual not-quite-friend and not-quite-lover territory. Gracing the end table was a beautiful bouquet of flowers from Laila, who he knew wouldn’t attend. Once, he’d woken her up before ten o’clock in the morning and was met with a wrathful growl, a red-eyed glare, and a vase flung at his head. When she eventually stumbled downstairs closer to noon, she had no recollection of the incident. Enrique had decided never to meet pre-noon Laila again. Then there was Zofia. Zofia would’ve attended and sat straight-backed in her chair, her blue-as-candle-hearts eyes alive with curiosity. But she was returning from a family visit in Poland.
In a moment of desperation, he’d considered inviting Séverin, but that felt callous. Half the reason he had arranged this presentation was because he couldn’t stay as Séverin’s historian and curator forever. Besides, Séverin wasn’t … the same. Enrique didn’t blame him, but there were only so many times he could accept a shut door in his face. He told himself he wasn’t leaving Séverin, but choosing life.
“I tried,” he said aloud for the hundredth time. “… I really tried.”
He wondered how many times he’d have to say it, for guilt not to creep into his veins. Despite all his research, they’d found nothing that could lead them to the Sleeping Palace, the place full of the Fallen House’s treasure and the one object within that Séverin was determined to find: The Divine Lyrics. Taking back The Divine Lyrics would be the final blow to the Fallen House. Without it, their plans to rejoin the Babel Fragments would crumble. They needed The Divine Lyrics, and perhaps then, Séverin would feel as though Tristan had truly been avenged.
But it was not to be.
When the Order said they would take over the mission, Enrique had felt nothing but relief. Tristan’s death haunted him. He’d never forget that first breath he took after he knew Tristan was dead—jagged and harsh, as if he’d fought the world for the privilege to draw air into his lungs. That’s what life was. A privilege. He wouldn’t waste it chasing vengeance. He would do something vastly more meaningful, more important.
After Tristan died, Laila had left L’Eden entirely. Séverin became as cold and unreachable as the stars. Zofia had stayed more or less the same, but she’d gone to Poland … which left Hypnos. Hypnos who understood his past enough, perhaps, to want to be part of his future.
Behind him, a voice called out, “Hello?”
Enrique leapt to attention, straightening his jacket and fixing a bright smile on his face. Maybe all his worry was for nothing. Maybe everyone really had been running late … but as the figure walked toward him, Enrique deflated. It wasn’t a member of the Ilustrados at all, but a courier holding out two envelopes.
“Are you Monsieur Mercado-Lopez?”
“Unfortunately,” said Enrique.
“These are for you,” he said.
One letter was addressed from Séverin. The other from the Ilustrados. Heart racing, he opened the latter, skimming it as a knot of hot shame coiled in his gut.
… we feel as though this position is outside the realm of your skills, Kuya Enrique. Age gives us wisdom, and we have the wisdom to push against sovereignty, to know where to look. You are only recently a man of twenty. How do you know what you want? Perhaps when a time of peace comes, we will turn to you and your interests. But for now, support us from where you stand. Enjoy your youth. Write your inspiring articles on history. It is what you do best …
Enrique felt oddly light. He pulled out one of the seats from the dining table and slumped into it. He’d spent half his savings renting the library’s reading room, arranging the food and drink, scheduling for the transportation of several artifacts on loan from the Louvre … and for what?
The door slammed open. Enrique looked up, wondering what else the courier had to deliver, but it wasn’t the courier at all but Hypnos striding toward him. His pulse kicked up at the sight of the other boy, with his mouth made for grinning and frosted eyes the color of fairy pools.
“Hello, mon cher,” he said, swooping to kiss his cheeks.
Warmth shivered through Enrique. Perhaps not all his daydreams were foolish after all. For once, he wanted to be sought after, picked first. Wanted. And now here was Hypnos.
“If you thought to attend the presentation to surprise me, I appreciate it … but you seem to be the only one.”
Hypnos blinked. “Attend? Non. It’s before noon. I hardly exist before noon. I’m only here to fetch you.”
Cold crept through Enrique, and he folded away his daydreams and shoved them in the dark.
“Didn’t you get the letter?” asked Hypnos.
“I got several letters,” said Enrique sullenly.
Hypnos opened the one from Séverin and held it out to Enrique.
* * *
A FEW MOMENTS LATER, Enrique joined Laila in Hypnos’s carriage. Laila smiled warmly, and he immediately curled against her. Hypnos held his hand lightly and caressed his thumb against Enrique’s knuckles.
“How did it go?” she asked. “Did you get my flowers?”
He nodded, his stomach still tight with shame. The Ilustrados had told him plainly enough that what he had to say was not worth hearing. But this, finding the treasures of the Fallen House, returning The Divine Lyrics to the Order of Babel … this could change everything. Besides, one last acquisition felt right somehow. Like he was not only honoring Tristan’s legacy, but also laying rest to this chapter of his life as the historian of L’Eden … as a part of Séverin’s team.
“No one came,” he said, but his words were drowned out by the sound of the carriage lurching onto the gravelly streets.
In the end, no one heard him.
4
ZOFIA
Over the past months, Zofia Boguska had learned how to lie.
In December, she told the others she was celebrating Chanukah in Glowno, Poland, where her sister, Hela, worked as a governess to their uncle’s family. But that was not the truth. The truth was that Hela was dying.
Zofia stood outside Séverin’s study in Hotel L’Eden. She still had her travel bag at her side, and she had not removed her outer coat or the violet hat that Laila said “brought out her eyes”—a statement that horrified Zofia and made her anxiously touch her eyelids. She had not meant to return so soon. There was no point when Séverin had not accepted any acquisition assignments, and her skill set had gotten them no closer to finding The Divine Lyrics. But two days ago, she had received an urgent letter from Séverin, instructing her to return to L’Eden, though he did not say why.
“Go, Zosia, I will be well,” Hela had insisted, pressing her lips to Zofia’s hand. “And what about your studies? Won’t you be in trouble for taking off so much time from university?”
Zofia had lost count of how many lies she’d told. In the end, she had no choice but to return. She was out of money. And Hela was right about one thing—she did seem better. Just days ago, Hela’s fever raged through her body. Once she slipped into unconsciousness, her uncle had sent word to a rabbi for burial rituals. But then a new doctor visited her uncle’s home. The man insisted Zofia had paid for his services, and though she did not remember doing so, she admitted him anyway. Hope provided flimsy statistics, but it was better than nothing. That night, he injected Hela with a pharmaceutical compound he claimed was available nowhere else, and promised she would live.