The Gilded Wolves (The Gilded Wolves #1)(85)

Zofia felt a stab of guilt. Laila had seen her. But Zofia had seen the brush and disappeared down another hall.

Step 2: I laid out three dresses for you. The dark one will be the least distracting because there are no asymmetrical frills. The light one will be the most comfortable. The embroidered one is for if you feel nervous because then you can count the stitches while you’re waiting.

Zofia brushed her hair and reached for the embroidered dress.

Step 3: On your vanity is a pot of rouge and a pot of kohl. Use them only if you wish. Cosmetics do not mean that you need them. They can be anything you desire them to be. Enhancement, armor, et cetera.

Zofia stared at the last step. She could not explain why it calmed her, but it did. On her vanity, she found the cosmetic pots Laila had mentioned. Zofia did not keep many things on her dresser beyond the wash basin and a clean towel. At home, she never spent much time on her face or hair. It inevitably ended up frustrating her, and she would simply turn to Hela for help. But Hela wasn’t here. Not yet, anyway. And if tonight went wrong, perhaps she never would be.

Once she was dressed, Zofia double-checked the pockets and skirts. All her clothing had some Forged aspect to them, and the embroidered dress was no exception. Her pelisse was made of Forged sulfur silk that could burst into flames—perfumed so as not to offend the nose—and she had altered her shoes along with Enrique’s and Hypnos’s to include blades in the heel.

In her drawstring reticule lay a mnemo bug and the silver cloth. Zofia fumbled, her hands damp as she tightened the reticule’s drawstrings. Just as she was about to leave her room, she caught a faint glow on her bedside table. She paused. It was a moonflower, Forged by Tristan to soak in starlight and serve as a night-light for those times when she got hungry and wanted to sneak down to the kitchens. Tristan was always working on botanical inventions the way Zofia already tinkered with new engineering developments. She smiled, thinking of the last invention he’d been working on: Night Bites. Projectile ink that could temporarily blind a person, much to Laila’s despair.

Zofia touched the moonflower softly. These past few days she had taken to sleeping in her laboratory and had not left the moonflower on her windowsill. A scrap of light clung to its petals, casting a luminous pool on the wood of her night table. Carefully, she picked it up, then lay it atop the items in her reticule. Tristan was never without a flower, either in his pocket or between his fingers. He would need one for the ride home.

Zofia walked toward the lobby. On the wall, the Forged torchlight seemed too bright. She rubbed her skin, scalded. Normally, she never entered through a hall where people could see her. But Séverin’s instructions before he left had been strict.

Be seen.

The thought made her nauseous. Zofia looked down from the top of the staircase. For a split second, the staircase did not appear at a slanted diagonal, but rather a steep fall, her body leaning off a precipice that fell straight to the floor. She swayed—

“All right, phoenix?”

Enrique was at her side, his arm around her waist. He removed it at once.

“I apologize. I thought you were going to fall.”

Zofia gripped the bannister. “I was.”

Zofia glanced at Enrique. Like her, he had dressed with care. She recognized the subtle armor of his clothes. Her invention where buttons could turn to marbles and make someone slip. The silk square in his pocket could become an iron shield. But then her gaze went … up. To his face. She had looked at his face at least once a day for approximately 730 days, and in that time it had not altered. It was still an objectively handsome face. She had noticed the lingering stares that followed him whenever he walked into a room. But her awareness of his features felt … different. More heightened.

“Um … Zofia?”

Zofia blinked, then realized she had raised her hand to touch his face. She pulled her hand back, looking at it thoughtfully.

“Your face is different.”

Enrique patted his cheeks softly. “Bad different? Good different? Am I still handsome, at least?”

Warmth zipped through the base of her spine. How odd. It was uncomfortable. But not painful. “Yes,” she said, and then took to the stairs.

The two of them wandered through the crowd. In one corner of the lobby were Turkish princes sitting around a game of chess. A woman whose hair looked like a sheet of ink drifted past them, her bright red sleeves touching the floor. The concierge desk was a circle of chaos. Room keys zipped through the crowd, knocking against the wrists of guests like dogs eager for a treat.

“How long do we have to stay here?” asked Zofia.

“Just until the clock strikes ten.”

Zofia glanced up at the large grandfather clock near the entrance of L’Eden. Ten minutes to go.

“Where’s Hypnos?”

“Ask and you shall receive, ma chère.”

Hypnos appeared at their side dressed in a bright purple, velvet coat. He waved his fingers. His Babel Ring twinkled there.

“You’re flaunting it!” Enrique scolded.

“Relax, it’s fake.”

Zofia eyed him. Where had Hypnos hidden his, then? A patriarch or matriarch could never be without their Ring because it was welded to them.

Enrique made a huffing sound.

“Fine. What about the rest of you? What are you wearing?” he demanded. “Séverin said go for subtlety.”