She walked back to the Sanctuary, taking her time, enjoying the solitude. The sun was out and it was pretty warm considering how early in the year it was. She passed a few people. They hated her, too. She let them.

She climbed the steps to the Sanctuary. The Cleavers standing guard were the only people to have ignored her presence in the last two hours. She prepared herself for a lot more of that, and entered the grand lobby. Lots of excited sorcerers walking by. Darquesse was defeated. Darquesse was done. The crisis was over. No need for panic, no need for worry. No need for Stephanie.

She found an empty room in which to change her clothes. She hadn’t gone for black. She wasn’t Valkyrie Cain. She was Stephanie, and Stephanie had always loved the coat that Ghastly had once made with the arms of burnished red. She dressed in trousers and a jacket of that same colour, a tight but flattering fit that made her look like she was covered in rusted blood. She grinned at her reflection, then put the black clothes Ghastly had made into the bag and went wandering. She found herself in the Accelerator Room.

“Hello, Stephanie,” the Engineer said. “How are you today?”

“Grand,” she said. “Great, I mean. Or I should be great anyway. Don’t really know why I’m not.”

The Engineer nodded. “Human emotions are difficult to navigate.”

“They are,” she agreed. “So how long do we have?”

“The Accelerator will overload in eleven days, four hours and eight minutes.”

“Right.”

“Would you like to use your soul to deactivate it?”

“Even if I wanted to, I doubt it’d work.”

“And why is that?”

“I’m a reflection,” said Stephanie. “I wasn’t born. I’m not natural. I’m a malfunction. I wasn’t given life – I took it. I don’t think I even have a soul.”

“In that case, step into the Accelerator, on to the dais, and I will attempt to extract your soul. If you truly believe that you do not possess a soul, you will not be harmed, so what is there to be scared about?”

“I’m not … I’m not scared, I’m …”

“If, however, there is a part of you that dares to hope that with all life there comes a soul, in whatever form, then I would advise you to decline my kind offer.”

Stephanie narrowed her eyes. “You’ve got a sneaky way of helping people.”

The Engineer made a movement that could have been a shrug. “I like people. I have helped many on my travels.”

“Why did you walk away in the first place? You were built to look after the Accelerator. That was your whole purpose. That was why you existed.”

“I stood here for decades. I grew bored.”