“The difference suggests what we’ll find,” said Séverin. “If it’s an act of ritual, that would suggest that what lies inside that cave is a real place of worship, a place where playing the divine lyre would work. If it’s an apology, then—”

“Then maybe playing the instrument would be a cataclysmic mistake,” said Enrique. “And that’s their way of telling us.”

“Who are they?” asked Zofia.

“Whoever came before,” said Enrique. “The fabric on the skeleton is far too decomposed to date. They might even be one of the Lost Muses who once protected the divine lyre.”

“Any other observations?” asked Séverin.

“A thin foil of metal had been applied to the skeleton’s bones,” said Zofia.

“An interesting decorative choice, but still not indicative of the skeleton’s purpose,” said Séverin.

“It had horns,” said Enrique, remembering the protrusions from its forehead.

Séverin paused. “Horns?”

He reached up, touching his forehead. Enrique remembered that strange hour in the catacombs more than a year ago … the gold ichor that dripped across Séverin’s mouth before giving him wings that shot out from his back and a pair of horns that curled from his temples before vanishing moments later.

“Bull horns, I think,” said Enrique, remembering himself. “Which to me suggests ancient Greece, or the Minoan civilization.”

“Like an animal, sacrificed…” said Séverin. His face lit up. “Like a scapegoat.”

“Scapegoat?” asked Hypnos.

“An animal ritually burdened with a community’s sins, then driven away. People did it to avoid catastrophes. They’d sacrifice an animal to avoid plague or a terrible storm,” explained Enrique. “It’s an ancient practice that’s mentioned in Leviticus, but they used goats, not people, hence the origins of the word ‘scapegoat.’”

“She wasn’t an animal,” said Zofia, almost angrily.

“Of course not!” said Enrique hurriedly. “But the process was similar. Some communities did use people. In ancient Greek, the scapegoating ritual of a person exiled from the community was called pharmakos.”

Hypnos reached for a new wineglass. “So you think this woman could have been exiled from a place and burdened with its sins?”

“I think that depends on what else we find inside that cave,” said Séverin.

As Séverin reached once more for the mind Forged map, Enrique found himself thinking about power. He didn’t know if he fully bought Séverin’s optimism that the lyre would grant them godlike power, but he was confident of one thing. When Enrique closed his eyes and thought of the mind Forged illusion, it wasn’t the golden bones or the siren’s stone lips that rose to the top of his thoughts … but the stench.

The cave brimmed with the stinking breath of something ancient and hungry. It was like standing before a creature who opened its jaws, the better for one to glimpse the cracked limbs still caught between its yellow teeth.

23

LAILA

Laila brought the blade to her palm and pressed down. She winced, but only out of habit … not pain. In those seconds, Laila felt nothing. Not even the pressure of the knife.