Skeletons didn’t normally frighten her. To her, they were like machines devoid of use, their anima flown out of them and moved onto something else in the unseen equation and balancing of the world.

But the way it had seemed to rear up out of the dark had thrown her. There was something in the way it turned and listed to one side … Hela’s head had turned in an identical fashion on one of the evenings when her fever raged at its worst. Beneath her sister’s blond hair and gray eyes was a skull. It might already be only a skull.

Zofia had been able to push the unknown from her mind until now, but seeing that skull summoned her fear up close in her thoughts. She felt frozen by all the things she did not know, all the things that threatened to undo her calm. Was Hela safe? Would Laila live? What would happen to them?

“Zofia…” said Laila. “What’s wrong?”

Zofia pointed wordlessly at the skull.

“Oh,” said Laila. “Don’t be frightened … it’s nothing. We knew there were dead down here, remember? They can’t hurt us … and … and I’m sure they are not hurting either. They’re dead, after all.”

Zofia looked up at Laila. Her friend looked different. Zofia regarded her features: paler skin, sunken eyes. Laila smiled, which should mean that she was fine, but Zofia recognized that smile. It was forced and stretched, which meant it was a smile performed for her benefit.

Hela had worn the same smile many times.

Zofia’s gaze dropped to Laila’s hand on her arm. Blood ran down Laila’s arm from a gash just below her elbow.

“You’re bleeding,” said Zofia.

“What?”

Laila looked down at her arm, her brows pressed down, eyes widened. It was a look of horror, Zofia realized. Laila touched the cut on her arm, her fingers coming away black as machine oil and not the dark red of blood. Blood smelled like old coins and salt. Laila’s blood did not. It smelled like metal and sugar, and reminded Zofia of the charnel houses in Glowno.

“I didn’t realize,” said Laila. She looked up at Zofia, her eyes huge in her face. “I … I didn’t even feel it.”

Zofia knew that was not common, and she knew that Laila’s uncommon moments made Laila feel sad and too different from other people. She didn’t want her friend to be sad, not when they were so close to a solution.

“I’m not feeling a lot of things lately,” said Laila quietly.

Zofia drew herself up. Her worries had no place right now.

“We will change that,” said Zofia. “It is why we are here.”

Laila nodded, wiping the blood off her arm.

“This”—Zofia pointed to the gash on Laila’s arm—“is a symptom of a mechanical failure. That’s all. We are all machines, and you are no different. We have parts that break and need fixing, and they perform different functions and have different utilities. We will find that break and fix it.”