Eva frowned. “I’m not certain—”

But then Ruslan stepped into the shadows behind Eva. “I think that’s a wondrous idea.”

Séverin nearly succeeded in hiding the sudden tremor that ran through him as Ruslan came into view. His grip on the box tightened. The divine lyre pressed against his skin, held snug by the Forged wristlet straps which had immediately wrapped around the instrument.

“You do?” asked Séverin.

“Why, of course! Why would I delay godhood? I already know the first thing I’m going to do”—Ruslan rubbed his bald head—“grant myself perfectly flowing locks.” He closed his eyes and smiled, as if imagining it. “But I doubt we will all be able to leave at once. It would draw too much attention. It might be best if the three of us left for Poveglia from the House Janus location, and I send for the rest of my House after.”

“An excellent plan,” said Séverin.

And it would be. There was something strange about the Fallen House members. Their limbs moved with an inhuman stiffness. When he looked at their eyes beneath their masks, they looked clouded and gray. They did not blink. Even without Ruslan, they seemed incapable of any agency. Eva had said that without Ruslan, they might as well be powerless.

“May I?” asked Ruslan, holding out his hands to the box.

Séverin’s heart rate kicked higher. May he what? Open it? Hold it?

Séverin held out the box. As Ruslan took it, the garden pliers slid and knocked into the inner wall of the box. Séverin stilled, wondering if Ruslan would notice. But the patriarch merely turned on his heel.

“Come,” he said. “Our gondola awaits.”

* * *

AS EVA DIRECTED them toward the drop-off location for House Janus’s Carnevale, Séverin noticed that the patriarch never took his eyes off him. Séverin held his gaze.

“You’ve told us precious little about where to find the map to Poveglia’s temple,” said Séverin, with feigned boredom. “I assume it is something mind Forged, like the vial you showed me during supper some time ago.”

Ruslan ignored the query. Instead, he glanced at his Midas Knife, turning it in his hands. “I’ve never told you my House’s true name, have I?”

Up ahead, the lantern light of elaborate palazzos spilled across the lagoon. Judging by Eva’s gestures, they would dock any moment now. Séverin forced himself to be patient.

“No,” he said. “I have not had the pleasure of that information.”

“Hmm,” said Ruslan. He tapped his teeth with the point of his Midas Knife. “It is a teasing name. My father told us we had the greatest treasures out of all the Houses … and yet such priceless objects were mere nail clippings of the real source.”

He knew Ruslan meant the Tower of Babel, the biblical construction that had nearly touched the belly of heaven. Western theory held that it was the scattering of such a building—brought about by a confusion of languages that halted its construction—that ushered Forging to the world. Where the pieces fell, Forging bloomed.

But that was only one view, as Enrique would say. And it was a dominant view simply because it belonged to those who had dominated.

Ruslan turned the knife in his hand. “I thought I could change myself, you know … I thought I could make myself fit in the world, or make the world fit me.” He started to laugh. “Now I am walking alchemy! I am the transmutation of flesh to gold! I am … so hungry. Truth, godhood … they will fill me up and I shall never be hungry again. That is all I want, my friend. An end to emptiness.”

Séverin held himself still. Usually, Ruslan would pose a question, would try to play. But there was nothing in the other man’s face but a naked hope. An unwelcome pity streaked through him. Ambition had made Ruslan toy with an object that gave him power, but that power came with madness. In some ways, it was not Ruslan’s fault. But that was not Séverin’s responsibility.

“We shall have it soon,” Séverin made himself say.

“Promise?” asked Ruslan. He was staring into his lap, running his thumb along the golden blade. He whispered under his breath: “I’d do anything.”

Séverin felt as though he were looking at a corrupted mirror. He knew that pose, that focus, that endless repetition of touching an object that had brought both hope and sorrow. His mother’s voice moved through him:

In your hands lie the gates of godhood …

He was different. He was not giving chase to something, he was already chosen. His hope was merely unrealized, not impossible.

He was not Ruslan.

Séverin reached up for his hood, pulling the mask over his face as the gondola came to a stop at a silent archway attached to a drab gray building.

“If you want godhood so badly, then why not give me more than a hint to the map that will take us to the temple?” asked Séverin.

Ruslan pouted. “Because I want you to be worthy of it, my friend. And I want to be worthy of it by having chosen you as my co-deity, you see?”

Séverin set his jaw. “You realize that by testing me, you might be denying yourself.”

Ruslan bowed his head. “In that case, I will consider myself judged by the universe to be undeserving of such a gift.” Then he looked up and laughed. “Everything in life requires faith, Monsieur Montagnet-Alarie. I have faith in you! Besides, you’ve already had a whiff of such a map, my friend, as you so cleverly surmised.” He gestured to a Fallen House member who brought a small box, no larger than a jewelry case. “Store it in this to preserve its knowledge.”

Eva moved closer to Séverin. Her colombina mask of silver and sapphire winked in the light.

“Oh, and Monsieur Montagnet-Alarie,” said Ruslan, leaning forward. “Watch out for dragons.”

* * *

THROUGH THE ARCHWAY, they stepped onto a short landing. From there, a dimly lit staircase spiraled into the dark. Séverin had taken a couple of steps when he realized Eva had not moved.

“Are you not coming?”

“And be killed on sight by the others?” said Eva. “No, thank you. I’ll wait for you here. But … will you tell them that I … I—”

“I will tell them,” said Séverin.

Eva swallowed hard, then nodded. “Go.”

The long staircase led to a courtyard roughly the size of a dining room. On the stone walls, watery light waved and spangled. Above, a Forged ceiling of glass revealed that he was underwater. The shadows in the water looked like plumes of ink. Just then, the long, dark belly of a gondola slid across the ceiling and vanished out of sight.

Set into the wall niches were statues of angels with their hands pressed together, their heads bent in prayer. Three statues of animals, all three meters in height, adorned the middle of the room. Their backs were stretched and hollowed out, forming something of a bench within each. One was a great wolf, its jaws cracked, tongue lolling, carved fur standing on end. Another was a winged lion mid-roar. Séverin recognized it as the emblem of Venice, the sigil of St. Mark, patron saint of the city. The third was a creature Séverin only recognized from Enrique’s lectures in the past: a lamassu.