The Gilded Wolves

by Roshani Chokshi

  “Well?”

  He leaned against the threshold. But he did not enter.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  Laila looked at him closely. His jaw was clenched tight. The sweep of his shoulders brittle. She could not see his eyes, but she imagined they burned in that moment.

  Laila crossed over to where he stood. He didn’t move. Didn’t change his position at all. She didn’t even realize what she was doing until she’d done it. She touched him … folding his hands between hers. She held tight even when a tremor ran through his fingers. As if his soul had flinched.

  “I found nothing at all. Do you understand me?”

  Look at me, she willed. Look at me.

  He did.

  Séverin’s violet eyes burned cold. In his gaze, she saw her guilt mirrored. What had they missed that let Roux-Joubert capture—and hurt—Tristan? What had they done wrong? They let each other stand like this, mutually clasped. Maybe it was just because it was still dark out, and the memory of this moment would dissolve with the sunlight. Or maybe it was because in that vast silence of uncertainty, they could feel each other’s pulse against their fingertips, and that cadence meant they could be many things, but not alone.

  A second passed. Then two. There was relief in this second, in holding and being held, but then he let go. He always let go first.

  Laila shoved her hands into the pockets of her guard disguise, her face burning.

  Séverin nodded in the direction of L’Eden. “Hypnos is on his way.”

  “Are you … are you going to tell him Roux-Joubert wants his Ring in exchange for Tristan?”

  Séverin’s gaze went flat. “Are you asking whether I’m going to sell him out?”

  Yes.

  “No, of course not!” she said hurriedly. “You aren’t, right?”

  He raised his eyebrow. “Do I look like a wolf to you, Laila?”

  “That depends on the lighting.”

  The corner of his mouth lifted. A ghost of a grin.

  “I’m not planning to walk into a trap,” he said. “I am, however, planning to set one.”

  * * *

  IN THE STARGAZING room, Hypnos sat utterly frozen in his chair.

  He looked at each of them in turn. His hands were flat against the tops of his thighs. Pity twisted through her. Though Hypnos was the tallest out of all of them, he looked like a child. His shoulders caved. He had worn that same bemused expression ever since they told him what happened to the Horus Eye. But that hadn’t shocked him nearly as much as Séverin admitting that Roux-Joubert had proposed an exchange. Hypnos’s Babel Ring, for Tristan.

  Hypnos laced his hands tight. “So. Am I to understand that you brought me here to inform me you’re going to turn over my Babel Ring to Roux-Joubert because you prefer to stab me in the front versus the back?”

  Zofia tilted her to head to one side. “Does that make a difference?”

  Laila winced. Hypnos looked horrified and then … hurt.

  “Why are you telling me this?” he demanded.

  Séverin leaned forward in his chair. “I’m telling you this to gauge whether or not you would be interested in being bait.”

  Hypnos regarded them, his expression curiously blank. “You … you aren’t going to give me to him?”

  “And end up with two Rings gone? No.”

  Hypnos rose to his feet slowly. “But the easier option is to protect yourselves.”

  “I’m confused. Do you want me to?”

  “Of course not, mon cher! I just want to make sure I understand what’s going on here.”

  Laila frowned. Why did Hypnos seem so delighted? She knew he wasn’t happy about Tristan being captured. His whole face had crumpled with sorrow when he heard the news. She’d even read his jacket to be absolutely certain, but the objects didn’t lie. Hypnos had nothing to do with Tristan’s imprisonment.

  “What’s going on here is that I need you to play bait,” said Séverin, enunciating his words carefully.

  Pure, unfettered relief spread across Hypnos’s face.

  “What’s going on here”—said Hypnos, his voice rising as a bizarre grin spread across his face, —“is that you care for me. We’re all friends. We’re friends going to save another friend! This is … this is amazing.”

  Laila wanted to hug him.

  “I never said that,” said Séverin, alarmed.

  “Actions have a better voice than words.”

  Enrique, who had been assembling the last bits of a projection, looked up and shook his head.

  “It’s actions speak louder than words.”

  “Whatever. I like my version better. Now. Let’s discuss this friend bait business.”

  “Bait business,” Séverin corrected under his breath. He reached for his tins of cloves. “Before we plan anything, we need to know who it is we’re dealing with. And you need to start telling the truth.”

  Hypnos blinked. “… Truth?”

  Séverin’s tin of cloves shut with a decided snap.

  “Roux-Joubert not only admitted to stealing the matriarch of House Kore’s Ring, but also said that he already knows where the West’s Babel Fragment is hidden, so then what’s the point of the Horus Eye? What else might it do if not to see a Babel Fragment?”

  “How do we know he’s not lying?” asked Enrique.

  Laila knew he wasn’t. Roux-Joubert had thrown his handkerchief into the dirt when he left. Lies always left a slimy film to her readings, as she measured up what the object had seen and what the person had said whilst holding it. But there was none of that to the handkerchief.

  “Instinct,” said Séverin glibly, but his eyes cut to hers for confirmation. “Besides, I know Hypnos is lying. Even in the library when the Horus Eye came up, his gaze shifted. So, tell us the truth, friend.”

  Hypnos sighed. “Fine. I wasn’t particularly forthcoming, but that’s not my fault … It was a secret my father told me not long before he died. He never told me what, exactly, the Horus Eye did, but he said that should House Kore’s Ring ever be taken, I must find the Horus Eye and keep it safe. He said the Eye had an effect on the Fragment.”

  “As in … it reveals a Fragment’s location?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “He never said what kind of effect?”

  Hypnos swallowed hard. “He never had the chance.”

  “Then why did you want the compass in the auction?” asked Enrique.

  “My father had been after it,” said Hypnos tightly. “He said he didn’t want even rumors of the Eye’s ability getting in the wrong hands.”

  “Did House Kore know what the Horus Eye could do?”

  “Not quite,” Hypnos admitted. “My father told me House Kore was under the impression that looking through the Horus Eye would reveal all somnos in weaponry, and that’s why they were destroyed during Napoleon’s campaign.”

  “What about the Order? Do they know?” asked Enrique.

  “No,” said Hypnos, a touch smugly. “The secret was only with the French faction and as far as I understood, only House Nyx.”

  “What does Roux-Joubert want with the Horus Eye then, if he knows where the West’s Fragment lies?” asked Laila. “Not to mention that he has House Kore’s Babel Ring and now wants yours too.”

  Hypnos worried his lower lip between his teeth and then looked up at them. He held up his hand, and his Babel Ring, a simple crescent moon with a pale blue sheen, briefly flared with light.

  “My Ring does not just guard the location of the Babel Fragment … it is said to have another capacity, though I confess I’m not sure how it works…”

  “What?”

  “It, well, it supposedly awakens the West’s Babel Fragment itself.”

  “Awakens?” repeated Laila slowly. “What, so a Babel Fragment is something slumbering beneath the ground? I thought it was a rock.”

  “That’s what most people think, but the truth is no one knows what it looks like.” Hypnos shrugged. “It’s also why every hu
ndred years, the knowledge of the Fragment’s location changes, moving to another group of Houses within the West. The Order uses a special mind-affinity tool where those who know the knowledge forget it instantly after one hundred years. They even use it upon themselves. It’s not supposed to be beheld.”

  All of them fell silent, and then Enrique spoke. “But you don’t know if awakening the West’s Fragment requires, say, both Babel Rings or just one?’

  Hypnos shook his head. “The Order has never specified. Sometimes the stories say it’s three Rings. Sometimes it takes just one. Who can say? The Babel Fragments haven’t been disturbed in thousands of years. No one would dare.”

  “What happened the last time someone succeeded in disturbing a country’s Fragment?” asked Laila.

  “Ever heard of Atlantis?”

  “No,” said Zofia.

  “Exactly.”

  “It’s a mythical city,” said Enrique.

  “Well, now it is.”

  “But we still don’t understand what Roux-Joubert wants with the West’s Fragment,” said Séverin. “The last group that tried to disturb the Fragment was the Fallen House, and they sought to join all the Fragments together. Maybe Roux-Joubert wants to emulate them, but we don’t even know why the Fallen House tried what they did in the first place. Do you?”

  “I do,” sighed Hypnos, looking around the room. “But first, where’s the wine? I can’t discuss the end of civilization without wine.”

  “You can have it after,” said Séverin.

  Hypnos grumbled. “The Fallen House believed that Forging was a subset of alchemy. You know, transforming matter and turning things to gold and such. But that was only one part of mastering their secrets. The most important aspect was theurgy.”

  “Which is?” asked Zofia.

  Enrique pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Theurgy means ‘the working of the gods.’”

  Zofia frowned. “So, the Fallen House wanted to understand how gods work?”

  “No,” said Séverin. A terrible smile bent his mouth. “They wanted to become gods.”

  Laila shuddered. Silence fell over them, broken only by the metallic chime of Séverin opening his tin of cloves.

  “We’re not going to find Tristan without figuring out who Roux-Joubert is,” he said. “We know he’s not with either House Nyx or House Kore. When he was at the dinner, the matriarch didn’t acknowledge him, and he didn’t sit with the other House members. So, we presume that he’s functioning outside the Order, or that someone in the Order is acting through him. We also know he has access to the Exposition Universelle because that’s where he first laid a trap for Enrique and Zofia, and it’s where he’s demanded that we do an exchange.”

  “In three days,” said Enrique. “Perfectly timed for the opening of the Exposition Universelle.”

  “So?” asked Zofia.

  “So, it means he’s waiting for a built-in audience,” said Séverin. “There’s something he’s planning on that date. You heard him. All his talk of ‘revolution’? What better stage to launch one than the world fair?”

  Hypnos deflated. “That tells us nothing.”

  “We also know that Roux-Joubert wears a honeybee pin,” said Enrique.

  “So? Today I’m wearing underwear. It’s hardly monumental.”

  Zofia frowned. “Why did you specify today—”

  Enrique jumped in, “The man who accosted us at the Forging exhibition also wore a honeybee pendant on a chain.”

  The chain in question currently dangled from Laila’s hands. Zofia had brought it to her earlier while they were waiting for Hypnos to arrive. The chain itself was not Forged, exactly. Something about it called to Laila’s senses. But images that should have been sharp in her mind now felt blurred, as if swiped with oil. Someone had tampered with the item. The only thing she knew for certain was that wherever Roux-Joubert was … it was underground. She could feel it. The lightless cold of it. Damp on the walls. Nails with crescents of dirt. And a symbol scrawled in light … pointed. Like a star.

  “Roux-Joubert also has a strong Forging affinity,” added Zofia begrudgingly. “He managed to tamper with a Streak of Sia formulation. Usually, the formula copies handprints, but theoretically, there are ways for the Sia formulation to act like a homing mechanism. He must have figured out the way, and that’s what led him directly to us.”

  “Who said it was his affinity, though?” asked Laila. “He could have someone working for him.”

  Enrique shuddered. “Don’t forget the gentleman with the blade-brimmed hat who accosted us in the exhibit. It could be him. What else do we know?”

  “He’s underground,” said Laila.

  The four of them turned to face her. Hypnos rested his chin on his hand, eyeing her suspiciously. “And how do we know that?” he asked.

  “I don’t owe you all my sources,” said Séverin protectively. “Does Roux-Joubert remind you of anyone?”

  Hypnos shook his head. “I’m sorry, mon cher, but I haven’t heard that name at all. I can always return to Erebus and check, of course. My house holds many secrets.”

  Enrique cleared his throat. “There’s something, though, about the honeybees … I’m starting to think it’s not a coincidence that both he and the man from the exhibition wore one.”

  “Not again,” groaned Hypnos. “It’s nothing but a symbol—”

  Laila hissed in her breath. She could practically see Enrique brandishing a sword.

  “Nothing but a symbol?” repeated Enrique quietly. “People die for symbols. People have hope because of symbols. They’re not just lines. They’re histories, cultures, traditions, given shape.”

  Hypnos blushed and plucked at his vest.

  Enrique turned to Séverin. “Can you get the lights?”

  Séverin snapped his fingers and drapes swooshed down to cover the bay windows. He snapped again, and a large black screen crept over the domed glass of the stargazing room.

  Hypnos snorted. “And you call me dramatic.”

  Ignoring him, Enrique straightened the cuffs of his sleeves. “I’ve been doing research on honeybee symbology for some time now,” he said. “But I only recently connected what Roux-Joubert said to the man who accosted us in the exhibition hall. Both spoke of revolution. Both wore that honeybee chain. Now, historically, honeybees have some mythological resonance, and I think I found a clue…”

  “Normally you’d be gloating by now,” pointed out Laila.

  Enrique sighed. “Let’s just hope I’m wrong about this clue.”

  He placed a small projection sphere on the coffee table. When he touched it, two images appeared side by side. They appeared to be mnemo scans of pages in textbooks or from museum displays.

  The first image showed a square, golden plaque. On it was a winged woman. From the waist up, she was human, but waist-down, she was a bee. The next image showed a faded painting of a Hindu goddess, bees radiating from the halo of her heavy crown.

  “Bee deities are not uncommon throughout mythology,” said Enrique. “The image you see here is a representation of the Thriae, a triplicate bee goddess—a recurring motif of trinity goddesses—who had the gift of prophecy. The other is a representation of Bhramari, a Hindu goddess of bees. Am I pronouncing that correctly, Laila?”

  “It’s Bruh-mah-ree,” she corrected gently.

  Enrique made a note and continued, “Where the honeybee motif gets interesting and potentially connects us to France is that honeybees were emblematic of Napoleon’s rule, though the reasons for why he chose his reign to be represented by a honeybee are contentious.”

  The image on the wall changed to show a bee embroidered on a rich, velvet robe.

  “Some say that when he moved into the Royal Palace at Tuileries, he didn’t want to allocate any resources to redecorating, but also didn’t want the French Royal emblem of the embroidered fleur-de-lis everywhere, so he turned it upside down. When he did that, it looked like a honeybee, and there you have it.”
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  Séverin sat up straighter. “Do you think Roux-Joubert has some connection to Napoleon?”

  “It’s possible,” he said. “Napoleon did lead multiple campaigns throughout North Africa and the Middle East to explore the area. He had a corps of at least two hundred experts, including multiple linguists, historians, engineers, and delegates from the Order of Babel who provided a range of Forging services. Their discoveries”—he paused to press the mnemo bug and change the image—“were fascinating.”

  The next image showed a slab of dark rock, covered in what looked like rows of text.

  “In 1799, that corps of explorers discovered the Rosetta Stone, and sparked a worldwide interest in ancient Egyptian artifacts, with many of the Forged instruments or objects going straight to House Kore. Bees were sacred in ancient Egypt as well because they were said to grow from the tears of the sun god, Ra. But I think the other reason they held such interest to the Order of Babel was because of their honeycombs.”

  “Honeycombs?” asked Laila. Honeycombs were delicious, but hardly the kind of ancient item she imagined would capture the interest of the Order.

  “I didn’t think of it until I remembered something Zofia had said.”

  “Me?”

  Spots of color appeared on Zofia’s cheeks.

  “You were the one who mentioned the perfect hexagonal prisms of honeycombs.”

  “What’s so great about a hexagon?” asked Hypnos.

  “Geometrically speaking, hexagonal prisms are the most efficient shape because they require the least total length of wall,” said Zofia, her voice rising slightly. “Honeybees are the mathematicians of nature.”

  “This,” said Enrique, changing the display yet again, “is a hexagon.”

  “I,” said Hypnos, clearly bored, “am a human.”

  Séverin’s jaw fell open. “I see it.”

  “See what?” demanded Zofia and Hypnos at the same time.

  Séverin stood. “Extend the lines and you get—”

  Enrique smile was grim. “Exactly.”

  “You get what?” demanded Laila, but then the image on the wall changed, and she saw what formed when the lines of a hexagon were extended: