The Gilded Wolves (The Gilded Wolves #1)(22)

Séverin was rooted to the spot. “Are they alive?”

“Do we have a deal or no?” asked Hypnos in a singsong voice.

“Are they alive?”

“They won’t be if you don’t swear the oath. We’ll be equally bound, Séverin. I assure you, it’s for the best. You’ll like working with me, I promise! I’m fabulous at parties, have excellent taste in menswear, et cetera, et cetera,” said Hypnos, waving his hand. “And if you don’t agree to this, then I will break every bone in their bodies, and etch your name onto the splinters. That way, your name will be all over their deaths.”

Hypnos’s smile was sharp as broken glass. “Still unwilling?”





7





SéVERIN


Wrath was the second of Séverin’s seven fathers.

Some of his fathers lasted for months. Others for years. Some had wives who did not let him call them mother. Some fathers died before he could learn to hate them. Others died because he hated them.



* * *



THE LAST TIME Séverin saw his father’s Ring, he was seven years old. The Ring was a pinched oval of tarnished brass depicting a snake biting its tail. The underside of the tail was a blade. After the fire killed his parents, the matriarch of House Kore dragged his father’s Ring across his palm, and the snake tail cut through his skin like a hot knife to a slab of butter. For a moment, he saw the flash of promised blue … the very glow his father had often talked of that proved he was the true heir of House Vanth … but then it disappeared, obscured by the sweeping cloak of the patriarch of House Nyx. Séverin remembered how they talked in hushed whispers, these people who he had once called “Tante” and “Oncle.” When they turned to face him, it was as if they had never bounced him on their knee or snuck him an extra plate of dessert. The mere span of a minute had rendered them strangers.

“We cannot let you be one of us,” said the matriarch.

He would never forget how she had looked at him … how she had dared to show him pity.

“Tante—” he managed, but she cut him off with a sharp brush of her gloved hand.

“You may not call me that anymore.”

“A pity,” Séverin heard his former oncle say. “But we simply cannot have more than one.”

A group of lawyers later informed Séverin that he would be taken care of until he came of age to inherit the trust funds of House Vanth, for though he was not the blood heir, his name appeared on every deed and contract, thus entitling him to the assets.

Séverin did not mourn the death of his father as much as he mourned the death of Kahina. His father had not allowed him to call her “Mother,” and in public she referred to him as “Monsieur Séverin.” But at night … when she snuck into his room to sing his lullabies, she always whispered one thing before she left: “I am your Ummi. And I love you.”

His first day in Wrath’s home, Séverin wept and said, “I miss Kahina.” Wrath ignored him. By the second day, Séverin had not stopped weeping and once more said, “I miss my Kahina.”

Wrath had stopped on his way to the commode. He turned around. His eyes were so light that sometimes his pupils looked colorless.

“Say her name again,” said the old man.

Séverin hesitated. But he loved her name. Her name sounded like how she smelled … like fruits from a fairy-tale garden. He loved how when he said her name, he remembered that she used to hunch over him, all that black hair curtaining over his small head, so he could pretend it was nighttime and therefore story time.

The moment he spoke her name, Wrath backhanded him. He did it over and over, demanding that he say “Kahina” until blood replaced the fairy-tale taste of his mother’s name.

“She’s dead, boy,” Wrath had said when he was finished. “Died in the fire along with your father. I don’t want to hear her name again.”



* * *



WRATH’S BASTARD BOY also lived in the house, though he hardly treated him like his own child. The boy was younger than Séverin and had wide, gray eyes. When Wrath was mad, he did not care which boy he took so long as one was taken.

In his study, Wrath kept a Phobus Helmet, a Forged object of mind affinity that coaxed out the wearer’s nightmares and played them on a loop …

Wrath only watched when the boys started screaming after the Phobus Helmet was secured to their heads. He never touched them except his occasional blows.

“Your imagination hurts you far worse than anything I could ever do,” he once said.

One day, Wrath called for the other boy. By then, Séverin had learned his name was Tristan. That day, he saw Tristan crouched in the shadows. Neither boy moved.

“Have you seen him?” demanded Wrath.

Séverin had a choice. He made it.

“No.”

Wrath took him instead.

The next day, Wrath called for both of them. Séverin was outside, wandering the grounds. Wrath’s footsteps echoed loudly. Séverin might have been caught if he hadn’t felt a small tug on his sleeve. The silent boy was hiding in the rosebushes. His lap was full of flowers. He scooted to the side to make room for Séverin.