She was sunburned, her hair was stiff and pale, and entirely unfamiliar muscles ached. Her standards of hygiene had been somewhat relaxed. She had developed new nightmares. She had seen violence. She had learned to ride and shout and haggle.And all that journey was only the tiniest fraction of the distance from Gloriana to the House Dolorous—a distance that the Engine crossed in days. The Line reduced the world to nothing.The cabin was small and dark. Outside in the Station’s grand Concourse, the high steel arches threw angular shadows, and the sober men of the Line went back and forth in shadow, in smoke, hard at work, so tiny in their dark suits. There was so much empty inhuman space in the Line’s places; dark spaces filled only with the echoes of the machines.Maggfrid heaved her bags into the luggage rack. He was clumsy. The Linesmen had beaten him badly, and besides, the Engine made him nervous. It made Liv nervous, too. They were inside the monster’s belly. An ugly fairy tale!She patted Maggfrid on his broad back and told him it was all right.
