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shadows were easier on her eyes. “Tobiat.” Her voice rang firm across the empty tier. “My son, Nat, and his friend, Kirit. They’re going to clean the low tiers as a punishment.”
    Tobiat. Invalids like him, as well as the very skyblind and the mad, were sometimes left behind as the tiers rose. They lived far downtower, on the edges of old quarters, scrounging for scraps. Many fell or starved, especially if they had no family to care for them. Or if their family abandoned them for being bad luck.
    Elna handed Tobiat a packet of dried fruit and graincakes. He released Nat’s cloak to clutch at it, nodding thanks. “Elna’s good people.”
    â€œHe’s chosen this tier to make his nest,” she said to us. “This will be a foul mess to start with.”
    Nat looked from his mother to the hermit, then deep into the tier. His nose wrinkled, and I joined him to see what he saw. Piles of stinking rags, shreds of ladders, broken wings. Too many to count. Tobiat had gathered parts of the tower that no one else wanted. We’d never get it clean enough.
    â€œWhy does he keep these things?” I whispered. “He’d be much better off letting them fall away with the rest of the garbage.”
    Nat shrugged. “Dunno. Not like I knew Ma was keeping him.”
    Elna secured herself to the ladder again, her wings unclasped just in case. She gripped hard, and she began the climb. “Vant said the guard will check on your progress by afternoon.” Her words were as much a promise to us as a warning to Tobiat to make himself scarce.
    Tobiat, his mouth full of dried apple, cackled and wandered away, trailing a frayed cloth that had once wrapped his body against the cold. I heard him mutter, “Cleaning, clean, cleaners.” He receded into the gloom.
    Nat passed me a rag and a bucket. “I wish we could use scourweed.” The tough fibers were reserved for Singers, for raising towers.
    â€œNot much grows on the lowtowers,” I said. “If we find some, I say we use it.”
    â€œI’ll keep my eyes open,” Nat said. For now, we were a team again, trying to work as fast as possible.
    Instead of scourweed, we found an old rain catcher, too broken to be worth lifting higher, and used it as a scoop. Then we started as far from Tobiat’s piles as we could, swiping at the mold and bird shit that had accumulated everywhere. I felt sick. Nat looked pretty green too.
    â€œTobiat,” he called, “we need to move your things.”
    Tobiat had piled wing battens and bits of broken carvings around what was probably his bed. Kept them a safe distance from the small fire pit. He had nothing that looked like metal. If he’d found anything that valuable, it would have been sold or stolen before now. I caught myself looking anyway, like a glitter-smitten kavik.
    Other piles had been pushed against the inner wall. One leaked dank vegetable liquid from the bottom.
    I kicked at it. “All trash.”
    With two fingers, I lifted a fetid pile of grayish cloth from the heap. The fabric was crusted with age-browned blood and gristle. I walked to the edge with it and had cranked back my arm to give it a good heave when Tobiat came out of nowhere, howling, “Mine, mine!” He grabbed, the fabric crackling at his touch, bits falling off. Stink rose, though whether from the cloth or Tobiat, I couldn’t tell.
    â€œDisgusting,” I said and pulled, while trying to keep myself back from the edge. Tobiat shrieked and yanked at the fabric, leaning way out. The thought of him falling, at my hand, nearly choked me. The clouds were too close here. As were the shadows that prowled the clouds.
    â€œNat!” I yelled. Nothing. “Nat! Help!” and Nat came running, finally. He coaxed Tobiat off the edge of the balcony and calmed him with a piece of goose. When I released the rags, the hermit bundled them into a ball and held them