Eve gagged at the stench that spread throughout the room. The enforcers had broken down the boards across the windows; work as delicate as what they were doing needed more than candlelight. Even if the sun had long since passed its peak.

  She and Ava stood over the table right next to the window, one of the dead Dreamers lying naked atop it. Out of respect, the enforcers had covered the man’s face with one of the old tablecloths. Though Eve didn’t see much difference. A corpse was a corpse, whether or not his face was covered.

  “Nothing,” Ava muttered frustratedly.

  She leaned back, her gloved arms just like Eve’s, smeared in small amounts of blood. She glanced at the bronze water clock sitting on the windowsill. Eve thought she struggled to steady her breath. But that made no sense. This was hardly the first time they’d seen blood, even if it was less than it should’ve been.

  “I know,” Eve said. “I said the same thing two minutes ago.”

  Ava looked up at her and sighed away whatever she’d been about to say. She removed her gloves, dropping them in the bucket they’d come with. She went to the shelf halfway across the room, dipped her hands in salt water, rubbed vigorously for at least thirty seconds, then dried them with the cloth lying beside the bowl.

  Finally, she lowered her mask, picked up her canteen, and swallowed a good amount.

  “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again,” Eve said, looking up at the ceiling. “It would help if we actually knew what we were looking for.”

  Ava sighed contentedly, taking one more swallow before she put the cap back on and came back to the body. “Eve, I know. But I’m here, too. I couldn’t ask her what exactly she wanted us to find. She just said we‘ll know it when we see it. Just a reminder, she’s your mother.”

  Eve rolled her eyes, flexing and shaking out her hands. They’d been here for five hours now, and in that time, they’d only done two corpses. Not that they were moving slowly; that was the usual time it took for such work. However, they weren’t necessarily making good time either.

  “We’ll know it when we see it,” Eve echoed irritably.

  She took a deep breath before glancing at the enforcer standing in the doorway. The man stood facing the hallway, clearly uncomfortable at the sight of what they were doing. She supposed he’d had his fill during the war.

  “Bring the next one.”

  The man nodded, eager to be out of the room. He left a weary quietness behind that Ava seemed to happily settle into. It was by no means difficult work, but it was draining. They hadn’t needed to perform one of these in years, not since they’d opened up one of the first Dreamers in the camp.

  She shook her head, thinking of Leo. Though she’d been taught growing up that Creation was simply a way of life, a factor of existence, not something to worship or pray to, she couldn’t help but feel guilty at the sadness she felt now.

  She’d at least gotten one of her sons back. It seemed incredibly ungrateful that, despite that, she still longed for her secondborn. She closed her eyes. It had taken a long time to block out her memories of that day, the day her son was dragged before the camp and killed in cold blood.

  “It would be amazing if she did this herself; she’d find whatever we’re supposed to know when we see it. Not that she’d get far. Still, you should’ve pushed harder, Ava.”

  Ava’s eyes darted away, and she licked her lips in that nervous way she usually did. “When you woke up from your coma—your unconsciousness,” she corrected at Eve’s glance, “I went with you to see her. Remember? She didn’t seem too happy to see me there. Obviously, she thinks I know whatever you spoke to her about, even though you won’t tell me. When she told me to search the bodies, she was so cold.”

  Eve looked at her. That might’ve explained why they didn’t really know what they were looking for, why Ava hadn’t asked, but it did not explain why she looked so nervous. Ava glanced at the water clock again, then back at the door.

  Eve narrowed her eyes. “What’s all that about?”

  “What?” Ava asked, the picture of innocence.

  “The sudden, quick breaths, your eyes darting everywhere, the way you’re licking your lips. What’s happening?”

  Ava simply blinked, though Eve could see her mind working, trying to find something to say.

  “Ava,” Eve said, suddenly growing more alert. Ava didn’t get nervous for just anything.

  They’d both gone to Ardition’s top medical university, which just so happened to be the best in the entire world. Ava, in particular, had conquered her squeamishness through repetitive exposure until she was left desensitized to the sight that now lay before them.

  No. This nervousness was something else, and Eve had a horrible suspicion of just what it was.

  “What did you do?” Eve asked.

  Ava swallowed, her eyes instantly dropping to the floor. “Eve, you know I would never do it on purpose. But if there’s something here that we can find, I know you’ll understand. She wouldn’t say what it was, so I don’t think it was something like poison.”

  “Ava, what did you do?” she asked again.

  “She mentioned she’d come in herself to see if we’ve found anything.”

  Eve closed her eyes, gritting her teeth. “When?” she managed to force out.

  “At four.”

  Eve glanced at the clock. The water had already dropped to the sixteenth marker. For all she knew, the Head was already on her way up.

  “Ava, I can’t believe you,” Eve complained. “You let me come here knowing she was on her way?”

  “I can’t do this without you. You were always better than me. I knew if I missed something, you would get it.”

  Eve pressed her lips into a thin line, looking out the window. Before she could say another word, two enforcers came carrying another corpse between them. Echoing the same respect they’d shown for the other two, they placed the woman gently on the table, her face covered with a tablecloth.

  Ava cleared her throat softly. “Is the Head here?”

  “She just arrived,” one of them answered. “She’s coming up now.”

  Ava nodded, thanking them for bringing the body. They retreated back into the hall as she went to put on a new set of gloves.

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  Eve went to the new body and gently started unbuttoning her shirt. She picked up the knife they’d used to remove their clothes and started cutting away at the sleeves.

  The woman’s underclothes came off next.

  “I’m sorry, Eve,” Ava said, “but it was for a good reason. Well, I hope it was, anyway. We still don’t know what we’re looking for.”

  Eve shook her head subtly. The rational part of her mind told her Ava was right. She was their best chance at finding something odd in the corpses. She also knew that if Ava had actually said something, she might not have come.

  “It’s fine,” she muttered. “Let’s just make sure we find something.”

  “So, you still haven’t found anything?” a new voice asked.

  Ava looked up and gave a greeting nod to the Head. Eve, on the other hand, retrieved the scalpel they’d already laid out on this table and got to work, not looking up once. She was so focused on trying to ignore the Head’s presence, she started her U-shaped incision higher than she’d done with the others.

  When it was clear Eve had no intention of answering her question, Ava spoke up.

  “Nothing yet. This is our third one now.”

  She straightened her spine a bit, saying, “It would really help if we had an idea of what we’re looking for. Organ failure? Other signs of toxicity? Anything.”

  Eve glanced at her, her hand moving with experience despite it being years since she’d done this. Ava was trying to make up for what she’d done. Her voice was steady, her chin held high, but her hands were pressed against the table in an effort to stop the subtle shaking.

  “In your professional opinion, you’ve found nothing wrong? With any of them?” the Head asked instead. “Nothing at all.”

  “We haven’t,” Ava said. “At least, I haven’t.”

  “Evie?” the Head asked.

  Eve was quiet, continuing her work on the body. She recalled the last time they’d spoken about that letter. It had clearly been too much to hope that the Head’s frantic reaction would have kept her disturbed and distracted for at least a week longer.

  Of course, life was rarely that kind. Although she should’ve known that when they’d taken her youngest son from her.

  She set the knife down, bending closer to the body to examine the blood. Even through her mask, she could smell death’s subtle stink. She moved her attention to the woman’s abdomen, studying the organs and her incision. There was no need to break open the sternum. She knew, like the other organs, that the heart and lungs would be fine.

  Wait a minute.

  She swiped her finger across the liver, the organ closest to her incision. The blood was less than it should’ve been. Much less.

  She’d noticed the same on the other two, but she’d simply thought it was due to the dehydration the Dreamers had been forced to suffer. The Head had said the Dreamers would be fed, but it would hardly be the first time she’d failed to meet her promise.

  Her eyes went back up to the beginning of her incision. Was that right? She leaned in, pressing another finger right underneath the skin at the point of her cut. It came away with a lot more blood. Almost as if all the blood that should have been in the abdominal area was now there. But that couldn’t be right.

  She picked up the scalpel again and went up into the woman’s throat. Once she pulled the skin back, the blood sat there clotted in thick clumps. They looked like large frogs sitting in a black swamp.

  “Where’s the rest of it?” Ava asked, leaning in from the other side.

  Eve pulled back, slowly removing the cloth covering the woman’s face. There were old dried blood tracks down her ears and from the corners of her eyes. Did she die because she bled out?

  A quick inspection showed her that there was no other place like this on her body. Her hands were empty, her arms, her legs, her feet—all of it nearly drained dry, the blood vessels sitting empty. Except her throat.

  Acting on a whim, Eve got to work on the other corpses, lengthening the U-shaped incision that had started at the base of their throats well up under their jaws. It was the same for the other two as well.

  A massive, abnormal clotting in the middle of their throats, old dried tracks running down from their ears and eyes. The enforcers had brought them in with their faces covered. In hindsight, they probably should’ve checked themselves.

  “You’ve found something?” the Head asked, her voice expectant.

  Hearing her voice was like a splash of cold water. Ava looked at her with pleading eyes and a subtle shrug of her shoulders. To her, if she explained it, it would feel as though she were taking credit. Eve sighed through her nose and walked back to the dead woman.

  She kept her eyes on Ava as she spoke.

  “The blood pooled up here,” she began, indicating the woman’s throat. “This type of clotting isn’t normal. As large as they are, there’s no swelling around the neck. There are bruise marks, though, as if someone strangled them. But that wouldn’t cause blood loss or clotting like that.”

  She moved to stand by the woman’s head, gently turning it to the side so they—so Ava—could see the tracks.

  “Now, they obviously have lacerations, but when we were going through the buildings floor by floor, we didn’t see any blood pooled around them. Not enough to explain why their lower halves look so empty. Yesterday, we didn’t think much of it, but that was before I saw the clotting.”

  “The neck,” the Head muttered to herself.

  Eve thought she heard the same tension that had been there when she’d told her about the letter and the man who’d given it to her. But that didn’t matter. As far as she was concerned, she was no longer part of the family. Her father was no longer here to bind her to the house, to this woman she’d once called mother.

  “There’s no way of knowing,” a voice said.

  Eve jerked her head around the room, looking for who might’ve said that. The enforcers were outside, all of them standing quietly, facing away from the door. Where did that come from?

  “Eve, what are you doing here?”

  She winced, realizing it was her father’s voice. Why was she hearing her father’s voice? She closed her eyes, leaning against the table for support. She suddenly felt lightheaded.

  “If your mother saw you here, she’d think you came around.”

  There was a slightly sad amusement to his tone.

  “Eve?” That was Ava’s voice. “Are you alright?”

  Eve straightened herself, glancing at the Head, who stared at her with narrowed eyes. Not a touch of concern present in those eyes, just a sharp attentiveness. She looked away from that gaze.

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Just tired. I didn’t get much sleep, and I didn’t eat. Since we found the problem, I’m heading back.”

  “What is that?” a child asked.

  It was her. She’d spent enough time in her memories now to know how the younger version of her sounded.

  So, it was a memory bleeding into her reality? That hadn’t happened before. What if she passed out again? They’d most likely think the coma was still affecting her. She began removing her gloves, adding them to the bucket Ava had dumped hers in earlier. Then she pulled off her mask.

  “Do you really want to know?” her father asked.

  “Wait,” Ava said. “You’re leaving?”

  Eve turned around and looked at her accusingly. That seemed to remind her of what she’d done. She gave a subtle nod, turning her eyes back to the corpses. “Okay, then. But you owe me,” she added, purely for the Head’s sake.

  “You should come by the house, Evie,” the Head. “We still have to talk.”

  Eve ignored her, pushing past the enforcers in the hall. Social expectation was the only thing that stopped her from running. But it was an effort to keep her back straight and her hands by her sides.

  “The beginning of our family’s history,” her father said. His tone almost sounded sad. “There are nearly over a hundred, but this one is arguably the most important. It started everything.”

  She could feel the reverence through her younger version’s eyes. Her father was looking at the book as though it were a piece of Creation itself.

  She finally reached the stairwell and paused. The wall to her right started transforming, a shelf of books straight from her father’s office. She could see the book standing in its own special place behind a glass screen fixed with a golden lock right in its center.

  Her father’s hand materialized as he reached out to touch the case, just as the stairs she knew she was still standing on started disappearing. With everything in her, she slammed the back of her hand hard against the shelf—no, it was the wall again.

  Pain erupted, every sense in her body focusing on it. The bookshelf vanished. The carpet in her father’s study, the book behind the glass case, her younger self, and even her father’s outstretched arm all disappeared as her mind could no longer focus on any of it.

  She found herself standing in the stairwell again. Without wasting another second, she started down. No doubt Ava would be repeating what she’d already said, but that wouldn’t go on forever. The last thing she needed now was to run into her mother.

  Hopefully, the pain would last until she was back home. It would be far easier to pass out on a bed.

  I’ll make it last.