Zofia raised her bloodied face, her blue eyes wild as she looked to Séverin. “They’re going to destroy the portal.”
Séverin froze. For a brief moment, he imagined what would happen. He understood why the people who had built the temple had hidden its true heart. If the portal was destroyed, then the lyre would never be played. There was only one last option to stop the automatons…
And it lay in his hands.
He knew the truth of it in a way he could not explain.
The moment he played the lyre, all Forged things would break around him. The automatons would go silent.
And Laila would die.
Against him, Laila stirred. He lowered her to the ground, heedless of the trees crashing into the stone steps, the strange vapors surrounding the temple rolling in like a deadly fog, the slowlylowering arms of the automatons overhead. She looked up at him, a defiant shine creeping into her swan-black eyes. She licked her inky, blood-black lips, and smiled.
“You know what you have to do,” she said.
“Laila, please don’t make me do this—”
“Majnun,” she said.
How many times had he wanted to hear her call him that once more? But not like this.
Laila reached for his hand. Her skin was far too cold. He looked down. The garnet ring was gone, lost in the debris of crashing rocks. Another tremor jolted through the steps. Laila’s other hand went to his cheek, and his eyes fluttered shut.
“I am not done with this world yet,” said Laila.
What happened next took place with such swiftness that he didn’t realize what had occurred until it was too late.
One moment, Laila’s hand was on his. The next, she had jerked it forward, bringing his palm to the strings of the divine lyre. Séverin startled, his fingertips catching on those gleaming cords—
The world went silent.
34
LAILA
Laila discovered that dying was not so difficult as one might imagine.
She remembered the pain from the last time Séverin’s hand touched the instrument… the slow pluck of death on her rib cage as if it would peel back her bones and shake out her soul.
But this time, there was no pain.
Maybe she was beyond it.
“Laila, keep your eyes open, please. I just need to get us to the top and everything will change—”
Laila blinked.
Overhead, there were trees, and if Laila could ignore the sharp, jolting steps or the sight of a monstrous bronze hand, she might have imagined she was at a park, lying in the grass and looking up.
When had she stopped going to parks?
She remembered a picnic, Goliath smuggled into a basket, Enrique screaming, Tristan insisting that the tarantula liked brie cheese and only wanted a little. She remembered laughter.
She would have liked another picnic.
Laila felt herself being thrown over someone’s shoulder. Hypnos, she realized. Hypnos was carrying her up the stairs.
“Keep playing!” called Enrique.
