The Gilded Wolves

by Roshani Chokshi

  “The library,” said Zofia.

  “Exactly. The House Kore matriarch will have no choice but to put away whatever it is. While Hypnos does that, I’m going to be tailing him and the House Kore matriarch.” Séverin removed his tin of cloves from his jacket pocket and popped one into his mouth. “Zofia. Tell him how the piranha solution works.”

  “It’s hydrogen chloride and sulfuric acid, so the chemical process is fairly simple—”

  “Not that way, Zofia.”

  She pointed at the glass vial. “I’ve Forged the glass with levitating titanium. All you have to do is break it, then throw it into the air of the greenhouse. It will fall slowly and spray acid from top to bottom. But once you break it, don’t let it touch your skin. Unless you want to disintegrate.”

  She started laughing.

  Séverin and Enrique stared at her.

  “See?” she said. “It’s like your joke earlier! Disintegrating!”

  “Oh, Zofia,” sighed Séverin.

  He glanced at his watch, his mouth flattening. “I need to take care of some things. I’ll see you when we exit. Separate carriages for all of us.”

  As they approached the Château de la Lune, the silvery mist reminded Zofia of the light that split the metal Sator Square. She remembered how it felt to watch the letters of the Sator Square slide back and forth, how the numbers had aligned perfectly into a repetition of zeroes and ones. Enrique had called mathematics the language of the divine. When she thought about the power of the Horus Eye, her skin crawled. What it could do did not seem within human grasp, but that was the thing about numbers. They weren’t like people, who could say one thing and do another. They weren’t like riddles of social mannerisms or conversations.

  Numbers never lied.

  14

  SÉVERIN

  When Séverin turned eleven, Envy and Clotilde gave them up, and Tristan and Séverin moved into the home of their fourth father: Gluttony.

  Gluttony was Séverin’s favorite father. Gluttony made funny faces and told funnier stories. Gluttony discarded garments after one day of wearing them. He threw cake with mild imperfections onto the streets. Jewels in storefronts disappeared almost as fast as he smiled. Gluttony had nothing to his name but a dusty, aristocratic title and some fallow land in the countryside. But this did not bother him.

  “Aristocracy is just a fancy word for thievery, my dear wallets. I am simply embodying what I was innately born with, you see?”

  He did not call Séverin and Tristan by name because he preferred to call children as he saw them. But names or no, he fed them regularly, found them tutors and even a Forging affinity specialist for Tristan. Tristan loved Gluttony, for he read him poetry at night and promised that he could reshape the world as he saw fit. Séverin loved Gluttony because he stoked a hunger within him.

  The tutors may have fed him languages and history, but Gluttony taught him diction and how to recognize the accent of wealth. He taught him how to level a man with a turn of phrase, how to order dishes and send them back. He taught him about terroir in wine and the godliness of a dish that satisfied all the senses.

  “It’s not just the fat, acidity, and salt, my dear wallet. It’s about devouring it with your eyes, licking flavors with your sight. And you must never underestimate the importance of presentation.”

  He taught him how to eat and how to hunger for things out of reach and how to steal without ever looking like you lack for something. He taught him all his tricks and all he knew until the day he took his nightly fifty-year-old aged tawny port with a dash of rat poison. At his funeral, Séverin stole a bottle of champagne from Gluttony’s favorite restaurant and left it on his grave.

  Of all his fathers, he thought of Gluttony the most.

  “Half of winning, my dear wallet, is simply looking victorious.”

  * * *

  SÉVERIN, ENRIQUE, AND zofia stood before the train doors. Outside the windows lay true night. Not the hesitant midnight of Paris, where gas lamps and trapped steam smudged the stars and threw the city into eternal dusk. Séverin could smell the countryside. Sweet grass and loam, the spring season too young to melt winter out of the air.

  Beside Séverin, Enrique touched his false mustache.

  “Am I pretty?” asked Enrique, plucking at his fake beard and patting his hands over his jowls, wrinkles, and age spots. “Be honest.”

  “‘Pretty’ is a stretch. Let’s call you ‘striking.’ Or ‘impossible to look away from.’”

  “Oooh. Like the sun?”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of a train wreck.”

  Enrique let out a wounded hmpf.

  After two years and countless acquisitions, Séverin knew how his team wore their fear. Enrique wore an armor of ready jokes. Zofia wore hers with mechanical calm, her eyes roving down the train compartment one last time, probably looking for something to count. In the silence, he thought he could see all their wants stretched out and warping the air.

  Three days.

  Three days and they would find and secure the Horus Eye. With it, Hypnos could protect the Babel Fragment’s location—maybe even find House Kore’s missing Ring—and his inheritance would be restored. Around him, lantern light flashed against the train’s stained-glass panes, turning it a shade of molten gold. Séverin’s scar twitched. He blinked, and the image of the golden honeybee found in the dead courier’s mouth itched at the back of his thoughts.

  A loud knock echoed through the compartment door. His cue to leave. Séverin touched his hat, not looking at them as he spoke.

  “After midnight,” he said.

  The two of them split, heading for different doors and different carriages. Their wants cast out in front of them, large as shadows.

  * * *

  HE KNEW HE WAS NEARING House Kore when the road changed.

  His father had brought him here when he was seven years old … back then, Tante Delphine—as he had known the House Kore matriarch—had taken him horseback riding. “He’s like a son to me!” she’d said. “Of course I shall teach him how to ride.” She’d held him close, his spine to her chest, her laugh in his ear. “Next summer, we’ll practice jumping. How does that sound?”

  But there was no next summer. There was nothing after the day she administered the inheritance test and dropped his hands as if he were rotten fruit.

  “Tante?” he’d tried, only for her to shudder.

  “You may not call me that. Not anymore.”

  Séverin quickly shoved down the memory. It belonged to another life.

  Ahead, the road split into five lanes that looked like rivers. One lane was polished hematite that looked like a ripple of silver. One lane glowed red and looked like twisted candlelight. The other, a pale blue, looked like a sky scraped of clouds. Beside it, a lane of glass appeared dimpled as if invisible rain kept denting its surface. And last, a lane of smoke. Beyond the five lanes disguised as rivers, fog and mist stretched or pinched into fantastical shapes—three-headed dogs yawning and baring translucent teeth, gigantic hands scraping misty nails down the mountain, women wearing ragged tunics, folding in half as they wept and wept and wept. Beyond that … well. Séverin could hear the music. The laughter.

  “Lethe, Styx, Phlegethon, Cocytus, and Acheron,” he recited softly.

  The five rivers in the home of Hades.

  House Kore had turned its country estate into an opulent underworld. How fitting, he thought, for this place was his hell.

  The carriage door opened on the River Styx. Before him stood an elaborate entrance: a glowing, jade skull of what might have been a monster dragged out of myth, with a row of teeth concealing verit stone. The barest prickle of ice ghosted over Séverin’s skin. When they’d tested the verit that Enrique and Zofia discovered, it had worked like a charm.

  It will work … It has to work.

  To the left of the verit entrance stood a group of three guards. Jutting over their shoulders, the points of their bayonets caught the flat, green li
ght of the stone.

  “Monsieur Faucher, welcome to House Kore’s country estate,” said the first guard. “If you do not mind, may we check you before you enter through the jaws?”

  “Into the belly of the beast, as it were.”

  The first guard let out a nervous laugh. The lightstick in his hand flashed. “May I?”

  “Of course.”

  Séverin forced himself not to flinch as the penlight neared his skin. Every time he saw a penlight, he thought of Wrath, who had used the penlights to double-check there was no sign left of the Forged mind affinity he used on them. He always knew when the Order was planning their monthly check-in because for twelve precious hours, Wrath would not place the Phobus Helmet on him. It was just enough time for traces of mind manipulation to disappear … just enough time that no one from the Order ever believed him.

  The familiar light flashed over his pupils. Memory conjured the nightmares of the Phobus Helmet behind his eyes, but just as quickly, the light flashed off, and the guard waved him toward the verit jaws.

  Behind him, he heard the scrape of carriages. The others had arrived right on time. Including—judging from the low laugh—Hypnos. Which meant Laila was here, pushing that gigantic icebox of cakes and Forged tools, all hidden by a verit stone concealed in the metal.

  As Séverin walked through the verit entrance, he held his breath … but the small nub of verit in his shoe had done the job. With the entrance behind him, he headed to a dock choked in fog and mist where Zofia and Enrique were already waiting.

  “Welcome to the country estate of House Kore,” announced a calm, disembodied voice from the air. “Please be advised that all boats may only transport three guests at a time.”

  A long boat carved of onyx rose out of the water.

  Once in the boat, the false Styx flowed beneath them, leading them toward a cave. The cave walls were hewn onyx, gleaming wet and lustrous. Stalactites dripped down from the ceiling. Within minutes, the small boat glided to a stop in front of another elegantly appointed dock, this one shrouded in mist save for the gigantic pair of ebony doors Forged with the snarling, barking faces of the three-headed guard dog of the underworld. Each head barked:

  “In—”

  “—vi—”

  “—tations.”

  The three heads kept their mouths wide. One by one, Séverin, Zofia, and Enrique placed their invitations onto the black tongues. The dogs’ jaws slammed shut, the heads melting into the wood and stone. A moment passed before the doors swung open. Light and sound and music poured out of the doors, blinding Séverin. The three of them stood, and the boat rocked beneath them. Once more, the dog heads appeared, this time a slip of velvet dangled from their teeth.

  “Take—”

  “—your—”

  “—masks.”

  They did.

  Zofia entered first. Then Enrique. Séverin went last. He couldn’t undo this step once he took it. Past the greeting vestibule, a floor of polished black marble drank up the light cast down from chandeliers of etched bone and stained glass. It looked like nothing he remembered as a child, and for that he was glad.

  Beneath the light, a delicate pattern spiraled across the floor, like that of a nautilus. A network of crystal vines and quartz veins formed the walls, as if they were sumptuously below the ground. Masked guests clad in black and gray and bloodred moved down the halls. An after-echo of a chimed gong lingered in the air. They had arrived moments after the dinner gong had rung. Only the matriarch and a group of her servants were left. She walked toward them, dressed in an oxblood gown and a choker of black diamond thorns. On her face, a gold mask.

  He stared at her a second too long, convinced she’d recognize him. She didn’t. The last time he’d seen her, he’d seen the blue glow on the Babel Ring—the color that declared he was the rightful heir—ripped from his sight. The last time she’d spoken to him was the last time he had a family.

  “Welcome to our Spring Festival,” she said in her smoky voice, her smile tight.

  She extended one velvet-gloved hand. Séverin noted the glove of her right hand was heavily padded. Her bones had not yet healed after the theft of her Ring. Enrique bent over her proffered hand and Zofia executed a perfect curtsy. The matriarch whispered something to her manservants, who immediately led them to different parts of the mansion.

  Last, the matriarch turned to him. Séverin had prepared himself for this, but practice paled to the reality of her. Eleven years ago, that gloved hand had thrown him in the dark and stripped him of his title. And now he had to kiss it. To thank it. Slowly, he held her fingers. His hands shook. The matriarch smiled. She must have thought him overwhelmed, stewing in his insignificance before this opulence. Before her. His eyes narrowed. Séverin squeezed the joints of her broken fingers.

  “So honored to be here.” He pressed his other hand atop hers, watching her breath hitch, her smile turn brittle. “Truly.”

  To her credit, the matriarch did not snatch back her hand, but let it fall limply to one side. He smiled.

  A tiny hurt was better than none.

  * * *

  SÉVERIN MISSED L’EDEN the moment he sat in House Kore’s dining room. It was nothing like the bright green of his hotel. Here, the ceiling had been Forged to resemble the inside of a jeweled cave. Hunks of bloodred rubies and cabochons of emerald and jasper cast stained light onto the onyx table below. Candles like flowers seemed to bloom from evenly spaced piles of snow. On the floor, Séverin recognized Tristan’s design—vines that sprouted beside guests, blooming to reveal dainty wineglasses, much to their awe and delight.

  As anticipated, his insignificance earned him a seat near the exit, far from the matriarch. Many of the people around him had been, or were soon to be, guests of L’Eden. They might have recognized him had they looked close enough. But they didn’t.

  Near the head of the table, Hypnos slung back his drinks with happy abandon while the smile on the matriarch’s face turned tense every time he spoke. Near the middle, Zofia had perfected the picture of aristocracy: bored and beautiful. She kept moving her fingers to a strange rhythm, eyes roving around the dining room. Counting again. When she met Séverin’s gaze, he raised his glass to her. She did the same, holding it aloft long enough that people saw.

  The meals progressed quickly: pan-fried foie gras, leek sprouts in a rich marrow broth, creamy quail eggs served in an edible nest of spun rye bread, and a tender filet of beef. Finally, the pièce de résistance: a single serving of ortolans. The songbirds were a rare delicacy, trapped and drowned in armagnac, a regional cognac, then roasted and eaten whole. The sauce dribbled thickly onto the plate, streaking ruby bloodlike smears onto the pristine white porcelain. At the head of the table, the matriarch led the meal. She took the crimson napkin and placed it over her head. The guests followed suit. As Séverin reached for his, the man beside him laughed softly.

  “Do you know what the napkins are for, young man?”

  “I confess, I do not. But I am far too enthralled with fashion to deny a trend.”

  Again, the man laughed. Séverin took a moment to study him. Like everyone else, he wore a black velvet mask across his eyes. There were wrinkles around his mouth, and his hair was streaked gray. What skin Séverin could see was pale and thin, waxen with illness. The man’s mustard-colored suit wasn’t obviously Forged, so he likely wasn’t aristocratic. Something gleamed on the man’s lapel, but he turned before Séverin could get a closer look.

  “The point of the napkins,” said the man, placing the napkin over his head, “is to hide your shame from God for eating such a beautiful creature.”

  “Is it our shame that we’re hiding or our delusions that we can hide at all?”

  Séverin caught the edges of the man’s grin from beneath his napkin.

  “I like you, Monsieur.”

  Séverin didn’t look too closely at the brown flesh on the plate. He knew objectively that it was a delicacy. Gluttony always said he wished for a dish of ort
olan to be his last meal. But Séverin had never approved them for L’Eden’s menu. It felt wrong.

  Cautiously, Séverin bit into the bird. The thin bones snapped between his teeth. His mouth filled with the taste of the bird’s flesh, tender and rich with the flavor of figs, hazelnuts, and his own blood as tiny bits of bone cut the inside of his mouth.

  He licked his lips, hating that it was delicious.

  Brandy followed dessert, and guests were encouraged to move to a separate lounge. As Séverin rose, he saw Hypnos whisper something to the matriarch of House Kore. Her mouth pursed into a thin line, but she nodded and whispered something to her manservant. Hypnos summoned his factotum from the edge of the room. The man carried a black box.

  This was it.

  Hypnos had invoked Order rule, and now the matriarch would have to safeguard the object by entering the vault. While the guests streamed out of the dining room, Séverin lingered by the door, pretending he had just seen someone he knew. The matriarch walked out the door, Hypnos on her heels. The left corner of Hypnos’s mouth turned up as he passed him. A signal to join. Séverin waited, giving them a head start. Then, as he was about to follow, the man in the mustard suit blocked him.

  He wheezed as he spoke, sweat shining on his forehead. “A pleasure talking with you, Monsieur…”

  “Faucher,” said Séverin, pushing down his annoyance. “I did not catch your name?”

  The man smiled. “Roux-Joubert.”

  Outside the dining room, the large staircase blocked off the light. The hall broke off into three separate vestibules. Séverin had memorized the layout earlier, including the entrance to the library where the Forged treasures were kept. He kept to the shadows. From the blueprints, he knew where House Kore kept their mnemo bugs and moved against their patterns of surveillance. At the entrance of a hall full of twisting mirrors, Séverin paused. He reached into the sleeves of his jacket, slicing the silk seams that hid a Forged bell designed by Zofia. He rang it twice, and his steps turned silent.