Every time she uttered those words to a lover, the truth felt smaller, as if she might someday wrangle it down to a manageable size and hold it in the palm of her hand rather than let it swallow her up entirely. Thejaadugarhad said her body—built rather than born—would not last past her twentieth birthday.Shewould not last, which left her with little over a month of life. Her only hope of survival wasThe Divine Lyrics, a book that held the secret to the power of Forging, the art of controlling mind or matter depending on one’s affinity. With it, her own Forged body might find a way to hold itself together for longer. But months had passed, and the trail to find it had gone cold despite everyone’s efforts. There was no option but to savor the time she had left… and so she had.
Now, a sharp pang bloomed in her chest. She placed the letter on her vanity. Her fingers trembled from reading it.Trulyreading it. The object’s memories flooded her head: Séverin pouring black sealing wax onto the paper, his violet eyes aglow.
Laila looked over her shoulder to the boy in her bed.
“I’m afraid you have to leave.”
A FEW HOURS LATER,Laila walked onto the frigid streets of Montmartre. Christmas had passed, but winter was not yet robbed of its holiday magic. Colorful lights winked behind frosted panes. Warm steam drifted from the bakeries, carrying the aroma ofpain d’épices, deep golden spice bread glossed over with amber honey. The world leaned hungrily over the cusp of a new year, and every moment, Laila wondered how much of it she would live to see.
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 neverwrittenit?
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 findingThe 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.Throughher. 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 forThe Divine Lyrics, as if by finding it, he might avengeTristan 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 number21. 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 steadyclip-clopof 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.
