Page 28

“What was your final test, then?” I ask.

He glances at me. Some dark emotion darts across his eyes, and I get the feeling that he’s done confiding in me.

He looks away and guides me toward the other side of the space. “Focus on passing your own,” he replies, dismissing my question. “With any luck, you’ll do so well that you won’t need to do a third and final test at all.”

We exit the main hall and step through into a darker space, where a massive choir screen of ornate gilded iron cuts through the center of the room. Two rows of stained glass windows arc across the top of the ceiling.

In spite of everything, I pause here for a moment to admire the exquisite detail at the top of the screen. The gray light filtering in from the windows adds a faint highlight to the gold ironwork, and for a second, the structure looks illuminated from within.

Suddenly, the light shifts a little. I blink and look around, only to realize that Étienne is gone.

That momentary awe fades into dread. Even though I’d been bracing myself this entire time for Étienne to make his move, I’m surprised by how disappointed I feel at his abrupt absence, a reminder that he isn’t here just to keep me company through my test. He’s a cat toying with his dinner, baiting me.

The space around me darkens, the shadows against the wall growing long. I glance over my shoulder, half expecting something to attack me. I narrow my eyes, my heart pounding.

As I step out of the sculpture hall, my ring suddenly sends a painful vibration through my hand. A warning.

I halt. I’d just exited the sculpture hall with the choir screen gate—but the hall I’ve stepped into is the exact same space, with the same choir screen towering before me.

I blink, then study the details of my surroundings. Everything appears as it had just moments earlier—the same clusters of people, the same tour guides in front of the same displays, the same statues staring sightlessly back at me. Even the conversations around me are the same as the last time when I’d passed through. As if I’m having a moment of déjà vu. As if we hadn’t just walked through this space a minute earlier.

Shivers of unease crawl down my spine.

It’s a trick, I remind myself, my gaze sweeping the room. An illusion. Look for the glitch.

I swear silently, then start searching for a flaw in my surroundings. Just like at the train station, it’s not enough for me to know that what’s around me is fake. I must convince my brain, must force it to bypass its own instincts.

But this particular illusion seems flawless. I make a slow, careful circle around the space, passing back through the opening under the choir screen and noting the statues around me. Saints and Spanish Gothic sculptures. A wooden piece, Virgin and Child in Majesty, painted in gold details.

There must be a false work here among them, or a detail on the walls that doesn’t make sense. Something I can point out and recognize, so that I can break Étienne’s illusion. But everything looks authentic. Real.

Again, I try to step through the exit into the next hall.

And yet again, I enter the same room, with the same choir screen towering before me. My teeth clench as I do another round of the hall.

At last, I notice something on the wall.

I follow the prodding of my subconscious. And there, I see it—a razor-thin groove running up alongside the wainscoting. It turns horizontal, cuts straight through one of the paintings, then down again. In the shape of a door.

This is the spot where the real exit should be, I realize, that leads into the next hall.

I walk toward it. The room’s security guard sees me and takes a step forward, ready to tell me to stop, but I ignore her and step right up to the wall. My hand reaches out.

And before I can brush against the wall—it falls away, plaster crumbling into dust and then into air, and I find myself standing in the adjacent room, all alone.

I hurry toward the exit, then find the same trick repeated in here. Again, I hunt for the seam along the wall, the ticket to reality, and break through another false wall. Another room. I’m nearing the stairs now that should lead up to the final exhibit floor, where the painting should be.

Finally, I reach a room where I should be able to exit into the stairwell. Except here, there is no seam along the wall that I can see.

I turn around in the room, staring at the paintings and the smattering of people, trying to puzzle it out.

As I take several steps forward, my boots suddenly splash into something wet.

I look down to see a rapidly forming puddle. Water is leaking into the space at an alarming rate, already covering the entire floor. On my hand, my ring sends such a sharp vibration through my body that it hurts.

I blink, looking at the other guests, but no one around me seems concerned.

An illusion.