The Gilded Wolves (The Gilded Wolves #1)(28)
Laila tossed aside one of the many pillows on her bed, then shook the gauzy drapes of her canopy.
“Where is it?” she said aloud. “Did you take it?”
“Why do I always get the blame?” demanded Tristan.
He was sprawled facedown on her bedroom floor. One of her pillows was propped under his chin as he painstakingly arranged her whole perfume collection in a line in front of him. Laila recognized every bottle except one, a glass sphere holding a number of black marbles.
“You could make yourself useful and help me,” she grumbled. “What’re you doing in here anyway? You have your own room.”
“I’m researching,” he shot back.
“Can you research somewhere else?”
“If I go to Zofia’s lab, she’ll give me a math lesson. If I go to Enrique’s office, he’ll give me a history lesson.”
“What about Séverin?”
Tristan made a face. Laila knew what that meant—the two boys were fighting. Typical.
“You know he cares about you, don’t you?” asked Laila.
Tristan ignored her. He reached forward, unstoppering one of her fragrances and taking a whiff. He grimaced.
“This one smells like a dying whale.”
Laila snatched the perfume bottle out of his hand.
“I like that one,” she said primly.
She looked at her bedroom floor. There were silks from former costumes that she was thinking about turning into drapes, baskets full of unfinished necklaces, an entire assembly line of shoes, and a couple of sketches from the cabaret artists who had drawn her onstage.
Laila tugged on a strand of her hair, agitated. “I can’t leave without my choker. I thought it was right—”
A pale glint of ribbon—just behind Tristan—caught her eye. Laila plucked it off the floor and dangled it in front of Tristan.
“Tristan! It was right next to you! You couldn’t look?”
He blinked at her, wide-eyed. “Sorry?”
“You are not sorry,” she huffed.
Laila spun on her heel, but the heel slipped … She fell backward. Tristan tried to catch her, but he didn’t move fast enough, and her head thudded painfully against the floor. Tristan shoved a pillow under her scalp. “Laila! Are you all right?”
As she tried to push herself into a seated position, her arm knocked the glass sphere holding the small, black marbles.
“My experiment!” cried out Tristan.
The glass sphere shattered. Instead of scattering on the floor, the black marbles bounced into the air. She looked up, her lips parted in shock as she stared at the hovering marbles. In a flash, they crashed down. Laila tried to shield her face, but one of them slipped past her lips. She instantly spat it out, and plumes of ink burst into the air, dousing her in thick shadows.
“Tristan!” she hollered.
Laila heard a scuffling sound right in front of her. She couldn’t tell from what since she couldn’t see anything. But then, in a voice that was unmistakably Tristan’s, she heard, “Uh-oh.”
* * *
ONE HOUR LATER, Laila was sitting in her carriage and wiping at a smudge of ink on her thumb.
The black marbles, it turned out, were Tristan’s newest Forged invention, combining cuttlefish ink and the cellulose within plant cells. When held in the mouth and spat out, they created a nighttime effect. Hence their name: Night Bites. They had the ability to drench someone in ink and choke off their vision for nearly twenty minutes. This was a very useful thing when one was fighting enemies. It was not very useful when one was supposed to perform before a crowded audience in a matter of hours. At least Zofia had been there to mix a chemical solution to wipe off the ink. Enrique had also “helped,” but he mostly laughed while Tristan ran around in circles shouting, “sorrysorrysorry.”
As her carriage jostled along the cobblestone road, Laila leaned out the window. In her headdress and mask, she was instantly recognizable. Even her carriage—which boasted a wrought-iron train shaped like peacock feathers—was meant to announce her presence. She preferred it that way. Being loud in one life allowed her to be quiet in others.
Paris expected drama from L’énigme. L’énigme burned jewels from ex-lovers (they were actually cleverly designed paste courtesy of Zofia). L’énigme had rivals (all of whom were friends who agreed on a predetermined schedule of “spats” for the public). L’énigme was a princess exiled for falling in love with a British nobleman; a demoness let loose upon the streets of Paris. L’énigme was a heartless temptress who danced because the snap of some poor man’s heart between her teeth was far better than any coin.
L’énigme was Laila, but Laila was not L’énigme.
The carriage pulled to a stop before 7, rue de la Paix, the fashionable address of Paris’s renowned couturier. Other carriages stopped too. Women in various states of costume, plumed hats, and jewel-studded reticules stepped outside, lingering just long enough so the crowd knew where they were entering.
Even though it was unseasonably cold for spring, Laila made a show of shrugging off her black mink pelt. The fur slid down part of her shoulder, exposing the bejeweled strap of her La Nuit et Les étoiles costume. The Night and the Stars.
Dusk drew a shroud of velvet across the rue de la Paix. Faint music melted into the sound of horse hooves on stone. In the distance, the Place Vend?me column looked like a needle that had punctured the sky and stolen its rain. The slicked streets drank in the lantern light, painting streaks of gold down the cobblestones. Around Laila, the crowd surged, loud questioning taking place over the cheers and shouts of admiration.