Sometimes crying or laughing are the only options left, and laughing feels better right now.

She tries to turn too soon, and the ladder smacks into Fernando's shoulder. "Oh! Sorry, Nando." The jolt knocks his glasses askew. He smiles at Christina and takes the glasses off, shoving them into his pocket. "Nando?" I say to him. "I thought the Erudite didn't like nicknames?" "When a pretty girl calls you by a nickname," he says, "it is only logical to respond to it.

"I'll be your family now," he says.

I read somewhere, one, that crying defies scientific explanation. Tears are only meant to lubricate the eyes. There is no real reason for tear glands to overproduce tears at the behest of emotion. I think we cry to release the animal parts of us without losing our humanity. Because inside of me is a beast that snarls, and growls, and strains toward freedom, toward Tobias, and, above all, towards life. And as hard as I try, I cannot kill it.

I should wonder what courage—which is the virtue they most value—has to do with a metal ring through your nostril.

We are not the same. But we are, somehow, one.

I shift from one foot to the other, trying to get a good look at him. When I finally do, I look away. His eyes were already on me, probably drawn by my nervous movement.