Hot seed cake kept rising from the lower stair.
The smell reached Aylin, changed direction, and curled around her face like steam from an offering. She covered her nose with one sleeve.
"It forgot the burned bottoms," she said.
Jiang answered with a tired call. The mistake was small and useful. Gredudande had learned her words, not the years of uneven ovens behind them.
The copper cups below struck the workers' rhythm again.
Lucia turned the hooded lamp toward the landing wall. "We choose what goes deeper before the next lesson improves."
Matthews pulled the return line tight from the rungs. Above him, its other end still circled the stone bench in Nerea's conservation room. "We need a stronger lamp, another line, and the long reflector."
"We need to see what each one becomes down here," Nerea said.
She signaled toward the open shaft. Lucia climbed to the room while the others held the first landing. Soon a shallow equipment tray descended on the return line, carrying the long reflector, two spare lamp hoods, folded screens, straps, and the rigid stand that had held Elias's stole.
When the tray touched stone, every object cast a separate shadow. Gredudande entered all of them before Matthews could retrieve the line.
From the straps, dark fingers unfolded. Inside the spare lamp hoods opened black mouths, while a shoulder rose through the rigid stand and wore its square frame as ribs.
"Release the tray," Nerea said.
Matthews let the line go. Lucia released it above. The tray stayed on the landing while its shadow climbed both lengths of rope toward living hands.
Aylin cut the lower rope-shadow with a green arc. Lucia killed the upper lamp, severing the other half before it reached the room.
The rigid stand lurched toward Devika. One bar-shadow hooked the care roll at her hip and pulled until the closed buckle pressed into her side.
Jiang struck the floor with his right foot. Devika shifted behind his low warning line as the frame-shadow swept where her knees had been.
He caught the loose tray cloth in his beak and dragged it across the stand's lower edge. Pain tightened his injured shoulder, forcing him to release after one pull, but the covered corner lost its shadow and the false ribs folded on that side.
Devika opened the thermal sheet between her body and the remaining arm. Its crumpled reflections broke the reaching hand into bright scraps. Aylin pinned those scraps with green light while Nerea chose the next move.
Nerea dropped her long reflector across it. In the lamp, two bright faces produced two rising bodies. One turned toward Nerea; its twin faced Jiang's silver-ringed mark.
Her scarred hand froze on the handle.
"It is using both faces," she said.
"Then give it neither," Lucia called from the shaft.
Nerea looked at the polished tool that had kept light between her body and the rod since her own shadow took a blade. She had built every safe experiment around its reach.
The twin silhouettes stepped closer.
Nerea kicked the reflector flat. Aylin drove cool essence over its edges while Matthews dragged the black cover across both faces. Darkness closed around the tool.
The two bodies collapsed together, fighting inside the cloth until Lucia hauled the covered reflector into the room above.
Nerea released her familiar tool to Lucia's pull.
"I know where that instrument fails now," she said. "It stays where I can keep it covered."
Losing it changed more than their equipment. Nerea had used the reflector as distance she could hold in one scarred hand. The lower route would force her close to the rod and dependent on someone else to close the lamp.
"If the aperture turns toward Jiang, I call it," she said. "Who shutters?"
"Aylin below, me above," Lucia replied. "You do not have to pretend trust feels comfortable for it to work."
Nerea tested her grip on the padded fork. "Comfort has performed poorly today."
Jiang respected the sentence more than any claim that fear had left her. Her empty hand shook while she picked up the padded fork.
They tested the remaining tools through action rather than trust.
Lucia lowered one hooded lamp by itself. Its single beam made one clean shade, and Nerea could close it with one hand. Devika unfolded her reflective thermal sheet just enough to prove its crumpled surface broke a human outline instead of doubling it.
The compact care roll remained against Devika's body. Its scissors, dressing, cloth, and fish strips stayed inside until needed, denying the small tools separate routes. She moved, knelt, and turned under the lamp while everyone watched for another reaching hand.
Jiang inspected the buckle from below. Its shadow stayed joined to Devika's hip until the loose strap swung free. He caught that end with his beak, and Devika tucked it under the roll before the wall could grow fingers from it.
Nerea held the sight rod under an opaque wrap with only its aperture exposed. The dark silver line followed Gredudande's core thread down the stair and ignored the covered equipment.
Her padded fork cast one narrow shadow. Aylin passed green light across it, and the shape remained attached to the object. Nerea tapped the fork against stone, then offered its handle to Matthews. The shadow followed the tool instead of choosing either person.
Matthews tried a second rope.
Its crossing shadow twisted around the first line and became a pair of arms. He cut the spare free before either arm found his wrists.
"One return," he said. "One person controlling it at each end."
"You hold this end," Lucia said.
Matthews stared at the lower stair. From below came Monsignor Elias blessing a child in the exact voice released from the ruined stole.
"It will use him whether I stay or go."
"Yes," Lucia said. "Staying places you beside a light you can close and a line you can release. Going places you where it wants your grief."
"That sounds like a gentle name for cowardice."
"Then choose a harsher name and do the work anyway."
Matthews closed both hands around the return line. He listened to Elias speak once more, then repeated the release motion with Lucia until neither grief nor surprise could make their hands argue. Only after that rehearsal did he look toward Jiang.
"If I pull, you come back even if the voice tells me I am killing him."
Jiang gave him one firm tap against the stone.
Lucia sat on the upper rung with the lamp shutter cord around her wrist. "I stay at the light. He stays at the line."
Nerea adjusted the wrap over the sight rod. "The lower route belongs to my instrument and my mistake. I go."
Devika touched Jiang's shoulder dressing with permission already held for care. The outer edge remained dry, but his feet still trembled after the pressure test. "My patient goes, so I go. I retain the stop."
Aylin watched the black branches under her collar reach toward the stair. "The route is using my trace. I go without offering it."
Four descending bodies. Two people holding the return.
The lower stair narrowed beyond the false wall. A human could pass sideways. Jiang could face forward, but loose straps would brush both walls and cast routes on either side.
Devika folded his towel into a shorter sling. "Front support remains mine. Your feet stay free."
Aylin stopped behind him. "May I take the rear for the lower stair only?"
Jiang looked at the dark steps, the copied seed-cake steam, and the trace pulling under her collar. Need made the answer urgent; the question still belonged to him.
After touching Devika's wrist, he gave Aylin one tap.
With permission, Aylin took the rear fold without touching his feathers. The sling held his breast clear and his injured flipper level while his webbed feet tested the first step.
Nerea went ahead with the hooded lamp and covered rod. Devika followed at Jiang's front. Aylin held the rear. No strap trailed beyond a chosen hand.
Matthews counted their shadows on the wall.
Nerea's stretched long beside the lamp. Devika's stayed broad around the care roll. Jiang's low outline moved between them, beak and broken tail distinct. Aylin's followed last with the trace drawn tight to her heel.
"Four descending shadows," Matthews said.
Lucia lowered the lamp shutter until only the descending beam remained.
They took another step.
The copper cups stopped.
On the wall ahead, a fifth silhouette stepped down with them.
It wore no head.