For in that second, her mind had conjured up fairy tales and curses, myths of girls instructed not to behold their lover at midnight lest they glimpse their true form. What Séverin had done then and how he’d flung out his arms during the troika fire were all cruel glimpses of the boy he had truly been. The boy who had rescued Zofia and given her a world of comfort, taken a chance on Enrique and given him a platform to speak, seen Laila for her soul and not just the flesh that encased it. She hated that glimpse because it reminded her that he was like a cursed prince, trapped in the worst version of himself. And nothing she possessed—not her kiss freely given, nor her heart shyly offered—could break the thrall that held him because he had done it to himself.

When she turned to Séverin now, he was staring hungrily at the Sleeping Palace. He swept his dark hair away from his forehead. The barest smile touched his face. Before, he would have reached into his coat pocket for his tin of cloves. He once said they helped him think and remember, but he’d stopped reaching for them after Tristan had died. Laila wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t as though not eating them would help him forget.

Laila returned to the others, and they watched as Séverin turned around the main atrium. Observation was his domain. She could hate him all she wanted, but she couldn’t deny that when it came to treasure, Séverin had a knack for understanding its context. Its story, in a way.

“We’ve been calling it a ‘palace,’” he said slowly. “But it’s not. It’s like a cathedral…”

Séverin made a note in one of his papers.

“What’s the holiest part of a cathedral?” he asked, more to himself than to the others.

Laila neither felt particularly qualified for nor interested in answering the question.

“The thing with the wine,” said Hypnos.

“How should I know?” shrugged Zofia.

“The altar,” said Enrique, shaking his head.

Séverin nodded, his chin turned so the winter light glowed across his face.

“Someone wants to play God.”

Laila’s mouth twisted into a hollow smile. Sometimes she wondered whether Séverin thought to do the same.

Ahead, four hallways branched out from the main atrium. Rather than risk being separated, they traveled as one unit, documenting things as they went. In the western hall was a library where nine female statues served as pillars. At least, it should have been a library … but all the shelves were empty of books.

“They might be hidden,” said Enrique longingly, his fingers twitching to explore the room. But he dutifully followed the rest of them.

The southern hall broke off into the kitchens and a small infirmary. At the entrance to the eastern hall, goose bumps prickled along Laila’s arm. In the distance, she thought she heard … growls? No, snoring. A pair of arched double doors etched with designs of wolves and snakes opened up into a dimly lit room where huge, jagged bumps covered the marble floor. Zofia broke off a phosphorous pendant, and the light revealed that she wasn’t staring at bumps at all, but a menagerie of dozens of ice Forged animals. Lions with delicate ice whiskers, peacocks with a train of frosted feathers, wolves whose glassy fur bristled and gently rose and fell as if they lived and breathed.

Laila instantly recoiled, but none of the creatures moved. She studied them a moment longer, her fear giving way to awe.

“They’re asleep,” she said.

The animals slept with their paws bent, hooves tucked, and wings folded upon a creamy marble floor. Only one animal—an ice rhino—bothered to open its eyes at the sound of the doors. Its gaze flicked toward them, but it did not move.

“I hate everything about this,” said Hypnos.

“Me too,” said Enrique. “Shut the door before they wake up.”

“The treasure wouldn’t be in here anyway,” said Séverin, frowning once more at the animals before shutting the door.

At each hallway, Séverin stopped to check the rooms for triggers that would activate any guard mechanisms. With the Fallen House, anything was possible. But none of the doors betrayed them, and none of the floors reacted. The spherical detection devices yielded nothing either. It was as if the Sleeping Palace were truly asleep. At every point, Zofia raised her phosphorous pendants, searching for signs of a Tezcat door in plain sight, but nothing revealed itself. As they walked down the final hall, the northern passage, Enrique pulled his coat tighter, glancing at the carvings where the wall met the ceiling.

“All the iconography shows women,” he said.

Laila hadn’t noticed that before, but he was right. All of the women in the frosted images covering the walls reminded Laila of priestesses. The detail of the ice didn’t seem to have faded over the years, and there was a curious sharpness to their eyes.

“None of their hands are showing,” said Enrique.

Small shivers crept down Laila’s spine, and she quickly averted her eyes. Their posture was too familiar. How many times as a child had she shoved her hands behind her back so her father wouldn’t be reminded of what she could do, or, as he later said, what she was.

So far, the northern hall was the longest. It grew colder the farther they ventured. At the front, Séverin looked over his shoulder and caught her eye. Laila discreetly made her way to him.

“Usual procedure,” called out Séverin.

“Here, Hypnos, hold the detection device—” said Enrique, as the rest of them busied themselves.

Now it was just her and Séverin.

Séverin didn’t look at her. “Anything?”

Laila took off her gloves. She reached for the icy carved door in front of them, letting her hands skim over the strange indentations at the threshold.

“I can’t read it,” she said. “It’s all Forged.”

“No trapping devices detected,” called Enrique from the back. “Let’s enter. Why’s it so narrow?”

“It’s like a corridor to a room of meditation,” mused Séverin. “Designed to make someone feel as if the path they walk, they walk alone.”

“Well, rather than standing here, let’s get on with it and go inside,” said Hypnos, crossing his arms.

“Can’t,” said Séverin.

“There’s no handle,” said Zofia, her blue eyes quickly scanning the door.

Séverin tried pushing it, but it made no difference. The door wouldn’t budge. Séverin dropped his gaze to the floor indents. “This place was designed like a cathedral. It doesn’t want brute force. It wants something else … something that’s honoring whatever is sacred inside here.”

Laila watched his face come alive with the puzzle of the room.

“Light,” he said, holding out his hand.

Zofia passed forward one of the pendants from her necklace. Séverin snapped the phosphorescent chip. The sudden glow carved out the shadows of his face, throwing them into sharp relief.

“Move back,” he said.

The four of them crowded into the small space of the hallway. Séverin dropped to his knees, flashing the light across the strange ripples and indentations covering the door.

“Found the opening,” he said.

He held his hand perpendicular to the ice and slid it down where it disappeared as if into a slot. But still the door wouldn’t budge.