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He picked out a tarnished brass star. Military insignia, but old. From before the city closed, before the prince built the wall. One of the few things Mac could ask the prince about without wouldn’t earning an impatient wave of her hand, was military history. Mac swallowed, his throat tight.

“That’s a good one.” Zeb peered over Mac’s shoulder. “Might catch a soldier.”

The old man’s sorrow had been carefully tucked away. Mac nodded, not trusting his voice. He closed his left hand around the star, metal warming against his palm.

Zeb removed a twist of cloth from his pocket. “Come on.”

Outside, Zeb crouched and held out his hand. After a moment of reluctance, Mac handed over the star. Zeb set it in the dust, and sketched a circle around it. He sprinkled salt from the cloth.

“When the ghost comes, just plunge your hand right in. Nature should do the rest.”

“I can’t move my hand.”

Zeb snorted. “You got two, don’t ya?”

Mac’s cheeks warmed. He crouched and closed his left eye, concentrating on his breath and heartbeat, trying to keep them under control. Would he know the prince, if she came to him? His siblings? Nerves made Mac’s stomach flutter. He gripped the dead arm with the living and held it over the circle.

Swirls of purple and red drew closer, sniffing around the edge of the circle. Mac forced himself not to close his right eye, too. His pulse jumped.

“There.” Zeb pointed. The glow over the star brightened.

Mac’s fingers wouldn’t let go. Panic locked him in place. He shook his head, trying to back away, but his legs wouldn’t move either.

With a grunt, Zeb grabbed Mac’s wrist and plunged the metal hand into the circle. Dust scattered. Mac tried to pull away, but Zeb kept his hand in place.

“’s for your own good.” A muscle in Zeb’s jaw twitched. “Let it go too long, and the flesh around the metal starts to necrotize. Fore you know it, your whole damned right side will be rotten.”

 An arc like lightning raced up Mac’s arm, through metal and bone, the joined flesh searing all over again. He bit down on a scream, teeth clenched, lips peeled back with the effort. He breathed rapidly through his nose. Metal fingers scrabbled in the dust. They snapped closed on the brass star like a trap, crushing it.

“What do I do?” Mac strained to move the metal hand.

“Relax. You’ll get the hang of it eventually. Sometimes it takes a while for the ghost to settle. For the moment, your hand has a mind of its own.”

A fresh wave of panic drew beads of sweat to Mac’s skin. The thing in his arm was hungry, mindless, wild. Even if he could draw the prince, or Liana, it wouldn’t be them.

Loss slammed him all at once. A deep sound of grief hauled itself from Mac’s chest. He tasted salt, his whole body shaking, save for the metal hand, still locked around the star and pinned to the ground.

“Here.” Something touched his shoulder and Mac looked up through tear-blurred eyes. Zeb held out a flask. “Won’t kill the pain, but it’ll help some.”

Mac took the flask with his left hand, fingers trembling. Light from the setting sun caught Zeb’s glass, turning the green gold. In his other eye, damp, Mac saw a mirror for his own pain—dulled by time, but there nonetheless, not healed, never healed, just scabbed over. Zeb nodded and turned, leaving Mac to his hurting, full up with his own.

After roughly an hour, and half the bitter contents of Zeb’s flask, one of the new metallic fingers uncurled. The sun had set, stars bruising the dark. Salt crusted Mac’s cheeks, clumsily wiped away. His chest ached, everything inside him raw and hollow. But had no more tears, and he could breathe.

He stared at the metal hand. It was as though a larger hand wrapped his from the outside, exerting constant pressure. Rills of power ran up to his shoulder and back down again. But with enough concentration, the idea of motion translated along those lines of power.

Another half hour or so and he convinced all the fingers to uncurl. Mac plucked up the crushed star, fighting the image of metal closing on flesh, mangling skin and bone. He didn’t dare ask the hand to do anything else, just let it trail at his side, shivering with the presence of the ghost.

Mac slipped the star in his pocket, dragging his weary body back inside. Behind him, the junkyard doors swung closed. Exhausted, he stretched out where he was, pillowing his head on his metallic arm. Minute vibrations made the polished joints shiver and hum. At least if his arm was pinned under his head, it couldn’t do anything unexpected.

“Help them.”

Mac jerked upright. Had he dozed? Starlight lit the junk piles, along with a thin sliver of unclouded moon.

“Zeb?”

Nothing stirred, no sign of Zeb. The voice he’d heard had been distinctly female. Rusty, yes, but female.

“Hello?”

No answer, then, faint, the rustle of midnight wings and a beak parting. “Help them.”

Mac scrambled to his feet, spinning a circle. He looked through his left eye, then his right. Nothing. His flesh puckered.

 He raised his metallic hand to his ear, cupping his palm to trap sound. A murmuring, like the rush of wind. “Go home.”

He jerked away from his hand. The metal arm remained bent, winking in the starlight.

“Li?” He breathed the name, heart pounding.

His fingers wanted to move, and he hadn’t asked them for motion. His first instinct was to fight. The metal ached cold, all through the false bones to the real beneath his flesh.

He brought the hand back to his ear, uncertain whether it was his idea. The back of his neck prickled. Again the whisper, the almost familiar buzz.

“Go home.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Help them. Help you.”

Mac pushed on the arm with his left hand, forcing it back to his side. The metal was cold. He listened, heart beating too hard. He breathed out. Following on the heels of his breath, a distinct and separate sound, a sigh.

“The ghosts that make the tech run . . . ” Mac licked his lips, letting the question hang. Weariness pressed out from inside his skull; his eyes, dust dry, ached from lack of sleep. Zeb scraped beans from a black pot balanced over the fire. He passed a tin plate to Mac, and Mac accepted it in his metal hand, spilling nothing. The delicate operation of spoon to mouth, he left to his flesh hand.

Zeb chewed, meeting Mac’s gaze with the eye not hidden behind green glass. Mac forced himself to ask the question.

“Are we haunted?” He tilted his head, indicating Zeb’s wrong-way leg.

“You been hearing things?” Zeb straightened, fingers tightening on his spoon.

Mac started, almost dumping his plate, nothing to do with his metal hand.

“Pay no mind.” Zeb leaned forward, the intensity of his gaze unsettling. “Get yourself in trouble thinking on things like that.”

“But the ghosts can’t want this, if we have to trap them, and . . . ”

“We’re living, they’re dead.” Zeb banged his plate down, raising dust. “Can’t trust a ghost. They want what they want. Our job is not to give it to ’em.”

“But . . . ”

“Listen, boy. There’s more than one way to be hungry. You start paying attention to those voices, you get better and better at hearing ’em. Pretty soon, you get muddled, forget which ideas are your own.” Zeb’s left hand made a fist. The way he clenched it made a livid, pink scar stand out against his dark skin. Mac had never noticed it before, but it ran all around the base of Zeb’s thumb, disappearing into his palm.

 “Put it out of your head.” Zeb pushed himself up. His rolling walk carried him away, closing the conversation.

Mac kicked dust over the fire, appetite lost. Outside, he followed the curved junk wall until he could see the city. A haze still hung over it, evidence of where the palace had burned.

Go home.

Mac started. He glanced at the arm, laying still against his right side. He raised it cautiously, listening. Nothing.

He glanced back over his shoulder. A pounding sound from within the junkyard spoke of Zeb, hard at work. He took a deep breath, forcing himself to relax. Zeb had been kind to him, saved his life. Mac owed him. Zeb had been out here on his own a long time; he knew a thing or two about survival. Mac made his way back inside, intent on finding Zeb and seeing if he could be of any help.

They’d spent the day hauling, moving, shifting, sorting. Mac’s body ached. Between the work and the fact that he was still healing, he was weary to the bone, but he couldn’t sleep. Questions nagged. The ghost in his hand, if it really was Liana, she wouldn’t want to hurt him, would she? Help them. She could only mean Cal and Trin. He could still set things right.

But what if Zeb was right? What if the ghost in his hand was trying to trick him, do him harm? But perhaps that was no more than Mac deserved. He rested his forehead on the metal arm, propped against his knee, closing his eyes.

The fingers cooled his brow. They were Liana’s fingers. Her voice, a lullaby.

“Hush. Rest.”

Soothing. Mac let doubt go. It was easier to believe, to listen the wordless melody. His sister would take care of him. She would forgive him. Everything would be okay; they would be a family again.

Mac jerked awake, heart drumming wild. Shadows piled thick through the junkyard. Even though the night was cool, sweat stuck Mac’s shirt to his skin. He threw back the rough blanket and rose, though he didn’t remember crawling into bed.

“Help them.”

Mac glanced at his hand. A hint of plum-red light rippled over its surface before fading.

“Li?”

A sigh swirled around him. He strained after it.

“Go home. Go home. Help them.”

Mac closed his eyes. It only made things worse, calling Liana’s image sharply to mind. Her eyes, fixed on his, lips shaping their question, hands bound, then turning to look over her shoulder as she climbed the gallows’ steps just before the hood slipped over her head. His eyes snapped open.

Go home.

The refrain pounded in time with his pulse. A fresh wave of loss formed a lump in his throat. Mac moved quick, afraid if he allowed a moment’s thought, he’d lose his nerve.

He found an old carry sack not too damaged by mold. As quietly as he could, he eased open the door of Zeb’s cabinet. Metal limbs gleamed in the starlight. He took what he hoped Zeb wouldn’t miss—a kneecap, a thumb, a third finger, a left foot. More. The sack hung heavy down his back as he slipped it over his shoulder.

As he eased the cabinet door closed, something caught his eye—a photograph tucked into the door’s frame. The young man had Zeb’s eyes.

Mac’s heart kicked. He almost dropped the sack. But Zeb had lost family, too. Surely he would understand. Mac closed the door.

He patted his pockets. The only thing they contained was the crushed brass star. A poor trade, but maybe Zeb could use it again. With one last glance over his shoulder, Mac set out for the city.

The empty water skin banged Mac’s hip. His legs ached and the sack of metal body parts bruised the small of his back. At least the ghost arm carried its weight, no longer dragging Mac’s shoulder.

When he let his mind wander, it whispered to him, words snatched by a wind he couldn’t feel, sliding just beyond his hearing. Sometimes, the ghost sighed. Just once it babbled, a near shout—
yeshomehelpthemhelpyou,
and its fingers drummed Mac’s thigh which such ferocity he nearly dropped the pack and ran. When the ghost shouted, it didn’t sound like Liana at all.

But when it sighed . . .

Mac ignored the salt-sting of sweat in his eyes and his growing thirst. He was closer to the city than the junkyard. More sense in going forward than back.

A breeze carried smoke from the city. Mac crested a rise in the sand, and all at once the city was there, spread below him. The wall had been breached, a section shattered and spilling out onto the desert floor. Mac closed his left eye. All around the base of the wall, hungry ghosts swarmed. He hefted his pack and half slid, half ran down the hill.

Merciful shade greeted him as he clambered over a broken section of wall. A beggar huddled next to the rubble, casting Mac a suspicious look from one rheumy eye. Mac tightened his grip on his pack, glad he no longer wore the ruins of his uniform.

People moved quickly, shoulders hunched and clothing pulled close against their bodies. By contrast, others strode, wearing weapons openly—brash knives at their waists, rifles slung across their backs. Were these Cal, Trin, and Liana’s compatriots? The ones they’d given their lives for rather than naming? Or had some other faction risen up, taken advantage of the chaos to seize power?

Mac ducked his head, hurrying toward the palace. In the courtyard, he paused. It was almost empty, the clock tower’s hands stilled. The fountain still ran, and he knelt, scooping water with his left hand, not caring that it tasted faintly of moss. No crows roosted on the gibbet arm, but Mac felt the weight of their stares anyway.

Why.

The smoke he’d seen from a distance centered over the palace. Mac tugged his shirt over his nose and mouth. He circled, watching for those watching him. There were none. He was only another shadow, another ghost left in the wake of the revolution.

He ignored the obvious entrances to the palace. Mac stopped when he found a spot where the bars were wrenched away from one of the windows rising halfway above the stones. He lay on his belly, peering into the dark, then pushed the carry sack ahead of him and wormed in after. His stomach dropped for the instant he had to trust the ghost hand to hold his weight, but the fingers didn’t betray him. He eased to the cell floor.

Iron loops embedded in the walls were still threaded with broken chains. A pile of straw filled one corner, and a bucket occupied another. Mac forced himself to look. Forced himself to breathe, drawing in the old scents of shit and blood. He didn’t need to close his left eye to conjure Liana’s ghost in those chains, dark eyes holding hurt, fear, confusion. He didn’t need to close it to see Trin spit at him, or Cal look away.

A single ghost clung to the wall above the pile of straw, stripped of identity. Mac reached out his good hand. The ghost didn’t stir. He let it fall.