It was a trap. She knew it as well as she knew her own heartbeat, as well as she recognized a cheat sitting at the faro table, but oh, it was baited so sweetly. What could she do? If she said no, it would be as if she had decided her sister was unworthy of her defense. But if she said yes…

She could almost feel the jaws of the shackles closing around her leg, the cold edge of iron biting into her skin. She could hear Abraxas’s warning not to trust the Virtues, that righteous men had a way of lying to themselves.

“I accept.”

Ibrahim clapped his wrinkled hands together. “Splendid.” He turned the parchment on his desk toward her and proffered his quill. “If you will sign here—as Semyaza, mind you, although Anant may be appended—I can take you to see Mariel.”

“Just like that?”

His teeth when he smiled were yellow and small. She hadn’t noticed them before.

“Yes, Miss Semyaza. Just like that.”

CHAPTER 8

They took the elevator down to hell.

Abraxas had told Hypatia there was a jail below the courthouse where they would be holding Mariel. But as the elevator rattled past the basement level, Celeste realized there were secret tunnels carved into the foundational rock on which Goetia had built its hall of justice.

As they descended, so did the light, until the only illumination was a divinity-powered lamp Ibrahim held high to hold back the darkness.

“How far down does this go?” She had not meant to ask, but she could feel the weight of the place, the press of thousands of tons of stone all around them.

“Almost there,” he answered, unperturbed.

“And you are keeping my sister down here?” There was a hysterical edge to her voice that she could not hold back.

He glanced at her. The lamp turned his features ghastly, creating shadows in the hollows of his cheeks and eyes. “We keep all our Fallen down here.”

“If the gloria can compel someone to tell the truth, why not simply give one to my sister and let her tell you she is innocent?”

“We do not compel the accused to confess. It is distasteful. And glorias are not infallible. There are complications in their use, for example, if the confessor truly believes their lie. The gloria cannot counter sincere belief.”

Abraxas had not mentioned that, and she wondered if he knew.

The elevator lurched to a stop, and he opened the cage and motioned her forward. “Did you know this was once a mine?” He closed the elevator door and nodded to the lift man. “Not a very profitable one. The lode was small and quickly mined to depletion. When they built the courthouse here, they found better uses for these tunnels.”