Her other promise.

It was a thing none of them ever dared to speak aloud, as if the promise was so fragile that to utter it again would snap the possibility in half.

And yet he carried the hope of it inside him every day: I will come back to you.

As the years passed, he began to dream of Laila. Sometimes she visited his dreams every night for a week. Sometimes she disappeared for years at a time. And yet every time she returned, she would say the same thing: I never got to finish what I began to say to you that night.

He knew what she meant. She had said, “I love—” and then the world had dragged him away from her.

Tell me now, he would say, and each time she would shake her head.

No, Majnun. I need something to dream about too.

THE WORLD TURNED. Wars erupted, kingdoms fell, fashions changed. The years blurred past, and yet Séverin found moments that seemed to anchor him despite time’s relentless momentum. There was the first time Luca threw his arms around him, and Filippo fell asleep with his head on his shoulder. Like him, it seemed as though the boys had many parents, and yet in this case, it was impossible to say which parent was more beloved.

Zofia conducted scientific experiences and taught Filippo numbers when he struggled in school. Hypnos snuck Luca his first drink at sixteen and spent the whole night by his side while he vomited and swore never to touch a bottle again. Enrique told them stories that kept them up at night, and Séverin did as his mother and Tante Feefee and Tristan had tried to do all those years: He tried to protect.

Even Argos grew to like the boys and did not seem to mind when they stuck his fallen tail feathers in the back of their pants and imitated the strange bird.

At first, Séverin could hide his continued youth with theatre makeup. But as every year passed, his youth became harder to disguise. After twenty years, he could hide no longer. On that day, he happily passed the reins of L’Eden to his adopted sons.

With Hypnos, he built museums and archives, funded visiting scholars, and loaned their pieces around the world. Enrique continued to teach and wrote books that found international acclaim. Zofia created and patented prominent inventions and was named an honorary alum of L’Ecole des Beaux Arts. Séverin was there when Luca married, and he was there when Filippo boarded a ship that would take him away from Europe and into the Americas. Séverin played with children and grandchildren, and spent countless evenings by the warm hearth where Zofia, Enrique, and Hypnos had made a home between the three of them.

Séverin was at their side for the rest of their lives, and he continued to be there for their descendants long after Enrique, Zofia, and Hypnos had passed from this world into the next.