All of them handed over their Codex volumes, which she stacked neatly on the nearest table, and then she searched each of the men with quick, efficient slaps. Glaudino squawked like a plucked chicken, but he was no match for Glain, who shoved them in one by one.

Glaudino began banging on the door almost immediately. She sighed and shook her head. “I tried to be nice,” she said to Jess, and then hit the outside of the door hard enough to make it shiver on the hinges. “Shut up, or I’ll tie you up and feed you to your lions!”

That got them blessed quiet. Jess fetched Morgan and Thomas, who’d been waiting in the shadows, and when he walked them into the workroom, Thomas’s blue eyes burned as if someone had lit a lamp in him. “Yes!” he said. “Perfect! You poor, lovely thing. What have they done to you, now?” He sat down on the bench, leaning over the lion, and Jess crouched down with him. Morgan took a seat nearby and watched with fascination as Thomas put his hands on the metal skin, very much as if he were petting a very live, friendly animal. “We will make you well. No, better. Much better.”

But then, in the next few seconds, the muted joy drained out of Thomas’s eyes and he began to shake. He sank down to sit next to the lion, put his head in his hands, and began quietly to cry.

“He needs to work,” Glain said, but at least she had the decency to mutter it to Jess, not to Thomas.

“He will,” Jess said, and sent her a warning look. “Leave him alone.”

“Do something,” she whispered back. But Jess felt helpless. He put one hand on Thomas’s shoulder and felt him shiver at the contact, then relax. Morgan took Thomas’s hand. Neither of them said a word, and Jess listened as Thomas’s ragged, labored breathing slowly steadied. He lowered his hands from his face but didn’t look up at them.

“Sorry,” he whispered. “I— Scheisse. I didn’t think I would do that. Why did I do that?”

Morgan started to speak but then couldn’t seem to find the words. She looked up helplessly at Jess, and he finally nodded and crouched down until he and Thomas were on a level. “I’ve never been through what you have, but I’ve been in the dark a few times. Sometimes the light’s just too bright.”

“What if I can’t—”

“Can’t adjust? You can. You will.” Jess nodded to the lion. “Even in the dark, you dreamed about your automata. They’re nothing to be afraid of.”

Thomas sucked in a slow breath and then quietly let it out. He nodded and opened his eyes, and put his hand back on the lion’s metal skin. It seemed to steady him this time. “All right,” he said. “All right. I just wish I had more references.”

Jess unbuttoned his uniform shirt and pulled it off. Beneath was his smuggling harness, dark with sweat. It had practically molded to his body, and he unbuckled it and peeled it off with a relieved sigh. The cool air on his damp skin felt as good as a bath.