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sharpness to my question comes from fear.
    “I’ve been working out that little problem in my mind since the moment I rescued you. I’m going to have to walk you home on the way to work this evening.”
    “But I can’t stay here all day.” My mother will be wringing her hands, and my father might come out of his lab looking for me.
    “This area isn’t safe for someone walking alone, especially someone like you.”
    “I won’t be alone. You will be with me.”
    “I can’t leave Henry and Elise.”
    “Well, bring them along. There’s a park near my building. I’ll pay for the fare, of course.” I reach for my bag.
    “There are no paid conveyances in the lower city.”
    He pushes his chair back from the table. The wood of the chair leg scrapes the wood of the floor, and the noise makes both of us wince.
    “Who wants to work a puzzle?”
    He chooses a box from a low shelf and dumps the contents onto a table. The children fight for pieces of a colorful jigsaw puzzle. The muted light slipping through layers of blankets over the window has become oppressive rather than comforting.
    “You never take them outside, do you?”
    Will and I stare across the table, into each other’s eyes. “No.”
    He holds my gaze for longer this time. I look down first.
    “Do you want to help with the puzzle?”
    “I’d rather lie down.”
    I go back to his bed. It feels odd, but there’s no other place to be alone in this tiny apartment. Pulling the blankets to my chin, I try to disappear. His wardrobe door is slightly ajar. I want to open it, see the shirts that he wears to the club, something more familiar than this place. But instead I curl up and try to sleep.
    I dream that I am on a sled, at the top of a hill. My arms are around Finn, but when we reach the bottom of the hill, I’m all alone. It’s icy cold, and there’s nothing but snow, no other children with sleds, no father, no Finn, even though I can still feel the warmth of him.
    I am alone. Crying, in a bed that belongs to a stranger who didn’t want me to die on his shift.
    “Don’t cry,” little Henry says. He moves soundlessly over the wood floor to stand beside me, but instead of just staring at me, he presses his cheek against mine, in an effort to actually comfort me. I can’t help wrapping my arms around him, this child who has taken the place Finn occupied in my dream. Holding him feels wonderful and comforting, but now I’m sobbing.
    “I don’t mind if you dry your eyes on my blanket,” Will says. “But maybe I’d better remove Henry.” He lifts the boy out of my embrace and gives him a gentle push toward the doorway.
    Will slides into the chair beside the bed, and I can’t get over how different he looks here, even though his clothes are the same, his hair, his tattoos. Maybe it’s just that I’ve never seen him in the daytime before.
    “Are you okay?” He sounds genuinely concerned.
    “You need to get masks for your brother and sister.”
    His jaw tightens. “You think I don’t know that? Do you have any idea how expensive…? Of course you don’t. How many masks do you own?”
    I swallow hard. I used to live underground. I don’t want to tell him that I have five masks: the regular porcelain one and a black full-face one in case I ever get invited to one of the costume balls that Prince Prospero loves. A purple mask with sequins, and two spares, in case my first mask gets chipped or stained.
    I can’t give one of mine to the children. Once you breathe through it, it is useless to everyone else. People used to steal masks. But now, even after a murder, you will see the mask, still covering the face of the victim, tossed aside with the bodies of the dead.
    “Come here,” Will says, leading me back to the kitchen. The children work their puzzle, uninterested in us. Opening a drawer in the china cabinet, he takes out a box. I recognize the heft and shape of it.
    The only things that are still manufactured in this city are masks and