On one hand, he marveled that humankind could create something like this—an enormous riveted marvel, big enough to let motors pass and also hold railroad tracks. On the other hand, the mists completely engulfed the bridge, giving it an even more skeletal cast. Humankind would create, and take pride in those creations, but Harmony’s presence could make it all seem trivial.

Did He know? Wax landed atop one of the bridge’s towers, boots clanging. Could He have saved Lessie?

The answer was simple. Of course Harmony had known. To believe in a God was to accept that He or She wasn’t going to deliver you from every problem. It wasn’t something Wax had ever dwelled on. Living in the Roughs, he’d accepted that sometimes you just had to weather things on your own. Help didn’t always come. That was life. You dealt with it.

But now, something felt different. He’d spoken to Harmony. Hell, Wax was out here right now because of a request from God Himself. That made it all the more personal. God hadn’t saved Lessie, hadn’t given Wax warning. And now He expected Wax to just hop to it and do as He demanded?

And what would you do? Wax addressed himself, walking along the bridge’s lofty pinnacle. Let the city burn? Let Bleeder keep killing?

Of course he couldn’t. Harmony knew that too. He had Wax by the throat.

Are you there? Wax asked, sending the thought out. Harmony?

He felt at his ear before remembering that he’d taken out his earring. By necessity, yes, but in that moment he was glad not to have it. Not to let God get a purchase on his mind, for the thoughts he had weren’t particularly pious.

Wax strode through the mists, while down below a lone motorcar puttered across the bridge. Bleeder was toying with him. He could feel her fingers sneaking in, piercing his skull, wrapping around his mind. He could see exactly what she was doing, yet couldn’t banish the questions she raised.

Wax paused at one end of the tower’s top. From here he could see the edge of the city, where the lights gave way to the darkness of the countryside. Behind him, the city was a brilliant blaze, thousands upon thousands of lights, but the electric lines hadn’t yet come out past the bridge. On the outskirts of Elendel, the lights stopped. The last few hung on the bridge, like lighthouses looking out at the vast blackness of the sea.

He yearned for that darkness. To leap out into it, escape all this responsibility—stop needing to worry about hundreds of thousands of people he couldn’t know, and get back to helping the few he could.

Freedom. Freedom, to Wax, wasn’t the absence of responsibility. He didn’t doubt that if he left again, he’d find himself as a lawman once more. No, freedom was not lack of responsibilities—it was being able to do what was right, without having to worry if it was also wrong.