The Gilded Wolves (The Gilded Wolves #1)(3)
“Bidding starts at five hundred thousand francs.”
A man from the Italian faction raised his fan.
“Five hundred thousand to Monsieur Monserro. Do I see—”
Hypnos raised his hand.
“Six hundred thousand,” said the auctioneer. “Six hundred thousand going once, twice—”
The members began to talk amongst themselves. There was no point trying in a fixed round.
“Sold!” said the auctioneer with forced cheer. “To House Nyx for six hundred thousand. Patriarch Hypnos, at the conclusion of the auction, please have your House courier and designated servant sent to the holding room for the customary eight-minute appraisal. The object will be waiting in the designated vessel where you may mark it with your ring.”
Séverin waited a moment before excusing himself. He walked briskly along the edges of the atrium until he made it to the quartz lion. Behind the lion stretched a darkened hall lined with marble pillars. The quartz lion’s eyes slid indifferently to him, and Séverin fought the urge to touch his stolen mask. Disguised as the House Kore courier, he was allowed to enter the holding room and touch a single object for exactly eight minutes. He hoped the stolen mask would be enough to get him past the lion, but if the lion asked to see his catalogue coin for verification—a Forged coin that held the location of every object in House Kore’s possession—he’d be dead. He hadn’t been able to find the dratted thing anywhere on the courier.
Séverin bowed before the quartz lion, then held still. The lion did nothing. Its unblinking gaze burned his face as moments ticked past. His breath started to feel sticky in his lungs. He hated how much he wanted this artifact. There were so many wants inside him that he doubted there was room for blood in his body.
Séverin didn’t look up from the floor until he heard it—the scrape of stones rearranging. He let out his breath. His temples pulsed as the door to the holding room appeared. Without the lion’s permission, the Forged door would have remained unseen.
All along the walls of the holding room, marble statues of gods and creatures from myth leaned out of recessed niches. Séverin walked straight to a marble figure of the snarling, bull-headed minotaur. Séverin raised his pocket knife to the statue’s flared nostrils. Warm breath fogged the Forged blade. In one smooth line, Séverin dragged the blade’s tip down the statue’s face and body. It split open; the marble hissed and steamed as his historian stumbled out of it and fell against him. Enrique gasped, shaking himself.
“You hid me in a minotaur? Why couldn’t Tristan make a hiding dimension in a handsome Greek god?”
“His affinity is for liquid matter. Stone is difficult for him,” said Séverin, pocketing the knife. “So it was either the minotaur or an Etruscan vase decorated with bull testicles.”
Enrique shuddered. “Honestly. Who looks at a vase covered in bull testicles and says, ‘You. I must have you.’?”
“The bored, the rich, and the enigmatic.”
Enrique sighed. “All my life aspirations.”
The two of them turned to the circle of treasure, many of them Forged ancient relics looted from temples and palaces. Statues and strands of jewels, measuring devices and telescopes.
At the back of the room, an onyx bear representing House Nyx glowered at them, its jaws cracked wide. Beside it, an emerald eagle representing House Kore shook its wings. Animals representing the other Order factions all around the world stood at attention, including a brown bear carved of fire opal for Russia, a wolf sculpted of beryl for Italy, even an obsidian eagle for the German Empire.
Enrique dug inside his costume of an Order servant and pulled out a rectangular piece of metal identical to the compass House Nyx had won.
Séverin took the fake artifact.
“Still waiting on my thanks, you know,” huffed Enrique. “It took me ages to research and assemble that.”
“It would have taken less time if you didn’t antagonize Zofia.”
“It’s inevitable. If I breathe, your engineer is prepared to launch warships.”
“Then hold your breath.”
“That should be easy enough,” said Enrique, rolling his eyes. “I do it every time we acquire a new piece.”
Séverin laughed. Acquiring was what he called his particular hobby. It sounded … aristocratic. Wholesome, even. He had the Order to thank for his acquisition habit. After denying his claim as heir of House Vanth, they’d blackballed him from every auction house, so he could not legally purchase Forged antiquities. If they hadn’t done that, perhaps he wouldn’t have gotten so curious about what objects they were keeping him from in the first place. Some of those objects were, as it turned out, his family’s possessions. After the Montagnet-Alarie line was declared dead, all the possessions of House Vanth had been sold. In the months after Séverin turned sixteen and liquidated his legal trust, he had reclaimed each and every one. After that, he’d offered his acquisition services to international museums and colonial guilds, any organization that wished to take back what the Order had first stolen.
If the rumors about the compass were right, it might allow him to blackmail the Order, and then he could acquire the only thing he still wanted: his House.
“You’re doing it again,” said Enrique.
“What?”