In all the time that Séverin had kept the bone clock, it hadn’trevealed any of its secrets. Although sometimes the clock stopped at six minutes past two o’clock, which he considered rather strange considering that there was only one word found on the clock:nocte.
Midnight.
Séverin often looked at it when he was thinking.
Fifty years ago, it had seemed impossible for anything to ruin the Fallen House. And now… to Séverin, the clock was a reminder. Anything could fall. Towers that scraped the heavens, Houses with pockets deeper than empires’, shining seraphs who had once been in the confidence of God. Even families who were supposed to love you. Nothing was invincible but change.
Séverin was still staring at the clock face when the letter from Hypnos arrived. He ripped open the envelope, scanned the first line, and scowled.
To be fair, you would have done the same.
Séverin’s knuckled grip paled.
Before you throw this in the fire, I do hope you listen to that seed of rationale deep within your fury. We are to work together, and though I might not extract my promises the best way, I always keep them. As I know you do.
Tell me what you need from me.
Séverin hated that word.Need. He hated how Hypnos’s promise of a new inheritance test had itched that very word to life.
Sometimes he wished he didn’t remember life before the Order. He wished someone with a mind affinity could root through his memories and shred those years. He was haunted. Not even by people, but the phantoms of sensations—firelight limning the outlines of his fingers, a cat with a fluffy tail who napped at the foot of his bed, orange blossom water on Kahina’s skin, a spoon dipped in honey and smuggled into his waiting hand, wind on his face as he was tossed into the air and caught in warm arms, words that sank into his soul like growing roots steeped in sunshine: “I am yourUmmi. And I love you.” Séverin squeezed his eyes shut. He wished he didn’t know what he had lost. Maybe then every day wouldn’t feel like this. As if he had once known how to fly, but the skies had shaken him loose and left him with nothing but the memory of wings.
Séverin rolled his shoulders. His fingers left damp impressions on Hypnos’s letter. He crumpled it in his fist. He knew what he was going to do. What he needed to do. As he walked out the door of his study, a phantom ache curled between his shoulder blades.
As if they craved the weight of wings.
THROUGH THE FROSTEDglass door of the kitchen, he saw their shapes crowded around the high-top counters. He heard the chime of bone china, silver spoons hitting tea saucers. The crisp snap of cookies. He could picture them with perfect clarity. Zofia carefully cutting her cookie in half, then dipping each half into the tea. Enrique demanding to know why she was torturing the cookies. Tristan scoffing that tea was hot, watered-down leaves and “Laila, is there any hot chocolate?” Laila. Laila, who moved like a sylph among them, watching them with those eyes that said she knew their worst secrets and still forgave them. Laila, who always had sugar in her hair.
He could sense all of them, and it terrified him.
He placed his hand on the doorknob. The oath tattoos on his right hand glared back at him. They might owe him their service. But he was the one bound to them.
He was the one who would always be left behind. Soon, Zofia’s debt would be paid off and leave her wealthy enough to start a new life. Soon, Enrique would join the inner circle of Filipino visionaries and move out of L’Eden. Soon, Laila would leave too. When she offered her services to him and trusted him with her story—as hehad trusted her with his—she told him there was an object she was searching for, and she would go wherever that search took her.
Which left Tristan. The only one who would stay of his own free will.
But what if they acquired the Horus Eye…
Hypnos would be bound to perform the test, and this time, no one would cheat him. House Vanth would be resurrected. As patriarch, he could give them more than just the connections of the rich. He could get Zofia’s sister into medical school; give Enrique access and intelligence for his Ilustrados; help Laila find the ancient book she searched for; keep his promise to Tristan.
He could give them more than just something to tide them over until the next acquisition. He could give them enough to stay.
The four of them stared when he entered. Judging from the empty teacup, they’d been expecting him for a while. After a long moment, Laila poured him tea. Even with her hair in front of her face, he knew she was smiling. He hated that he knew that. Two years ago, he hadn’t thought such things were possible.
Back then, Laila had just started working at the Palais as his spy and in the kitchens as a pastry chef. One day she barged into his study, her hair streaked white with flour, carrying a glossy, jewel-bright fruit tart in her hand. Already she’d charmed half the staff and secured more acquisitions than he’d ever been able to do on his own. That she spent most of her free time wandering the library or the kitchens wouldn’t have bothered him if she hadn’t kept trying to force her creations on him or spouting her opinions on every little thing when he was trying to work. Worse was that she wanted nothing in return. She would leave cakes on his desk, and if he tried to pay her, she’d smack his hand.
“Try it, try it,” she had insisted that day, pushing back his chair and holding out a piece.
He’d been too startled by the unexpected way she kept manifesting—like a dream recurring when it was just forgotten—that he didn’t have time to say, “I don’t want any damn sweets.” Her fingers parted his lips. Flavors turned incandescent on his tongue. He might have moaned. He couldn’t remember anymore.
“Taste that?” she had whispered. “There’s zested yuzu from the orchards, instead of lemon rind, and vanilla bean, instead of only vanilla extract. The glaze is hibiscus jam I made myself. Not some boring apricot. What do you think? Doesn’t it taste like a dream?”
That was the first time he realized he couldfeelher smile. Like light pressing against closed lids. He blinked, opening his eyes, watching how her lips pulled into a grinning crescent. Since then, whenever she smiled, he remembered the flavor of that fruit tart, the tang of hibiscus and soft vanilla. Unexpected and sweet.
Enrique cleared his throat, and Séverin shook himself.
“Finally,” said Enrique. He popped the last cookie in his mouth. “Consider that a penalty for showing up so late,” he said with his mouth full.
Séverin pulled up a chair, feeling their eyes on him. Of course, Laila was the first to speak.
