He peers through his fingers. “Yeah?”
“Of course.”
Dropping his hands, he frowns, looking over my shoulder. “You were at the game we played on the lawn.”
I spin around to see Lila emerging from the dark.
“Hi!” Lila smiles, nervous. “Sorry to interrupt, but—you weren’t coming so I wanted to check on you.” Dust splotches across her white shift, and her hair springs out of her protective style, which twists from the sides of her head to the nape of her neck. Dirt smears across one cheek.
“Bye, Avery,” Benji says, then flees down the stairs. At least he said something this time.
“Bye!” I call, then groan, turning to my friend. “Whathappened to you? You need to wipe down before we go to the king—oh planes, we’re so fucking late.”
“I came to tell you that he dismissed us for dinner.” Lila offers a palm, her ring already illuminating. “But I want to spend time with you.”
She laces us to her room.
“So,” Lila starts, barely giving time for me to catch my breath. “Ever since you said you believed me about something at the center of the Pith, I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s like a flood of memories, entering the chambers with my father. I remembered the word he used for access.”
“A word?” I ask.
“Like a spell woven into the very essence of an object. A verbal way to unlock it. And I know which door we’ll use. The king’s apartments connect to the queen’s, so that’s the riskiest route, especially since we don’t know what time he’ll be done trying to forge the dagger.”
“What are you saying?”
“Who was Maxian before he became king?”
“A prince?”
“And where do the royal children reside?”
“The Salon of Stars. But—”
“It’s empty, since Maxian has no wife or offspring.”
“And how are we going to get there?”
Lila grins. “You forget I am a chimney cleaner’s daughter.”
My friend steps up to her collage wall of fabric dyed with spices: a swaying meadow, a swath of flowers that surrounds a rendering of Lucan’s Tree. Lila hooks a fingernail into a knot in the trunk and tugs. The fabric rips—and so does my heart as my friend tears a gash in her own art.
“No!” I reach for her elbow. “What are you doing?”
“Look.” She nods to the wall.
The fabric curls from the dark stone beneath it, like a shadowy pit. It’s a niche in the thick wall that has been scraped away, dusty layer by dusty layer. Lila reaches into the space, and when herfingers draw back into the light again, they clutch a thick iron ring of keys.
“I think he wanted to leave me more than just his debt. This was all he had,” she whispers.
“A great gift,” I say. “The ability to enter spaces that exclude our kind.”
“And yet I’ve always lacked the courage to do it. I was never afraid to enter the apartments before. I always had my father.”
“And he had you.”
“Perhaps the real key is not courage but company.” She meets my eye. “Let’s go now, while we’re not needed.”
Lila wants to search the labyrinth, to stand where we’re told we cannot. A growing urgency sweeps over her face, a desire to traverse like Lucan. I have secrets to collect like a creditor with his coin. And like a creditor, I do not feel like asking for permission.
