Still.

The promise of a third helper was more than she could resist. And so, slowly—reluctantly—she relented.

“I’m thrilled to hear it!” Oliver threw an eager arm around Laylee’s shoulder (which she quickly shoved off) and said, “Because while I see you’ve had a nice long bath and a fresh change of clothes, we”—he motioned to himself and Alice—“are crawling with filth and, quite frankly, if I don’t do something about it soon I’m going to rip these clothes off right here and now, and then, I reckon, you’ll all be sorry.”

Alice laughed and nodded in eager agreement, and Benyamin smiled at Alice like she spun stars for a living, and Oliver yanked off a dirty sock and flung it over his head, and Laylee—

Laylee was so abruptly and unexpectedly entertained that, for the first time in a long time, she had only to pretend a little to be kind. It had been too many years since she’d spoken to so many persons at once, and she could hardly believe she still knew how to do it. Her arms were decaying, her vision was graying, her hair had lost its luster and her bones were bent in all the wrong places and somehow, even now, Laylee had never been more relieved to be alive.

Another small shoot of hope had shoved through the cracks in her heart, and the sudden rush of feeling had left her a little light-headed—and a little reckless. And so she postponed her washing (despite her better judgment) for later, and instead accepted an invitation to go into town and have a bit of fun with children her own age. It was a decadence she’d dispensed with long ago, and its lure was too much to deny any longer.

Just a few hours, she promised herself.

After all, it was Yalda—the greatest celebration of the year—and Laylee wouldn’t mind eating one last pomegranate before she died.

The train station was a many-roofed magenta house, bezel-set with hundreds of octagonal windows. It was a wooden relic that had aged gracefully with the seasons, and its ornate wood panels and intricate moldings made it clear that great cost and care had once built this small center of transport. It stood strong and dusky in the snow—determined to creak with dignity as the wind shook its ancient beams—while skeleton trees stood tall on every side, bare branches hung with fresh icicles and hooting owls. As for the train itself, it would be arriving shortly.

The children marched toward the station, Alice’s heart racing, Oliver’s teeth chattering, Laylee’s bones clicking, and Benyamin’s brow furrowing as he wheeled his barrow up the slight incline. The massive golden doors opened at their approach, and the four children hurried inside to take refuge from the cold.

Laylee was still adjusting to human company.

The experience was not altogether unpleasant, but currently she felt as though she’d grown three unwanted limbs and hadn’t yet learned how to manage them. Alice, Oliver, and even Benyamin (who understood that, for the moment, it would be best to defer to Laylee on all things) looked to her for their every need and question, and she was feeling both flattered and revolted by their attentions. Just now, she hadn’t even a moment to dust off her cloak before Alice was touching her and asking whether she might have time to use the bathroom before the train arrived. It was an innocent inquiry, but it was quite a lot to ask of Laylee, who’d spent the last two years of her life in near-perfect isolation. She felt unqualified to answer such a question. How could she be expected to speculate on the bathroom habits of another person?

Benyamin was kind enough to shuffle Alice away before any harm was done, but that meant Oliver was suddenly left alone with Laylee, and for long enough to make the both of them uncomfortable.

They took their seats at one of the many long pews stretching the length of the station, and Laylee was finally able to unburden herself of her bones. She dropped the heavy sack onto the space next to her, and the disturbing sounds of a dismantled skeleton echoed throughout the building.

“So,” said Oliver, clearing his throat. “What’s, um, what’s in the bag?”

Laylee, who had not been looking at Oliver, made a great show of turning in her seat. She pulled back her hood and leveled him with a careful, probing stare—a stare so unsettling that he abruptly stood, promptly fell over, and quickly stumbled to his feet. He was breathing heavily as he stalked off, mumbling something about excuse me and beg your pardon and needing to speak with Alice straightaway.

Laylee covered her face with one hand and smiled.

She was beginning to like Oliver.

The train station was entirely empty save their four-person party and the one lady working behind the ticket window. The lady’s name was Sana Suleiman, and she’d worked the ticket window for as long as Laylee could remember. But Sana did not live on the peninsula with Laylee and Benyamin, and more important, she hated her job. She thought Laylee was terrifying and Benyamin horrifying, and though she’d asked management—on at least seventeen different occasions—to have her transferred to another station, all of her requests were met with silence.

(A quick note here: Train tickets didn’t cost money. Transportation in Whichwood was considered a public service and was therefore subsidized by the town; the tickets were just for keeping track of things.)

Laylee walked up to the ticket window just as Sana was chewing on a sizable chunk of her own hair. Alarmed, Sana spat the hair from her mouth, sprang to attention, and spoke without ever meeting Laylee’s gaze.