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Alma wrapped her arms around me. “It’ll work. We’ll get Lilja back.”

I nodded against her hair. My uncle walked in. Again, I didn’t have time to busy myself with pretending to study a vase or fiddle with my cuff or whatnot.

“Is something the matter, Selma?” he asked, and the concern in his voice only made the tears multiply.

I cleared the thickness in my throat. I could lie, although my brain was suddenly completely empty of tall tales that might be believable. I had stubbed my toe? I had lost my favorite chisel? Those were all so silly and nothing to cry about. Besides, I found I didn’t want to lie. At least not about the things I could tell him.

“It’s Lilja,” I said. “She’s… she’s my sweetheart, but I might never see her again.”

My uncle put his hand on my shoulder. “You’re a good pair. I’m sure you will.” Neither his face nor his voice held surprise.

“Did you guess that too?” Alma asked her father with a wry lift of one eyebrow.

My uncle shrugged. “I mean, the way she looked at you, Selma, how could I not?”

“How?” I asked because I had noticed nothing of the sort. Sure, I had gawked at her, but I hadn’t seen any of the glances the other way.

“Like you were a Da Vinci at the Louvre,” he said.

“She didn’t.”

Alma laughed. “She did. From the very first day.”

I had known Lilja had grown fond of me because I was kind to her, but I wasn’t exactly gawkable. At least I never thought so.

My uncle got what he had come in for—a brass picture frame—and Alma walked with me back to my own house with the book under her arm. It seemed to be her constant companion now.

At my bench, I decided I couldn’t dawdle anymore. I picked up the last piece and set to shaping a sphere for the head. Alma admired Helena’s progress before she sat down by the oven with her book and her notes.

“You’ll know every symbol by heart soon,” I told her. “You’ll rival Stali himself.”

“It might be useful. Think of Lilja’s flight. It was only possible because she had taught herself the runes that let her escape.”

“I’ve never known anyone as determined as you.”

Alma laughed. “Except for you. Remember when you were twelve and you decided to carve a toy horse carriage all by yourself? The very hardest thing to make. You were so stubborn. You refused to give up until you had it perfect.”

“It was a waste of wood.”

“Practicing your skill is never a waste,” Helena said, her lips no longer holding pins. “Especially not when it’s your livelihood.”

It took me until lunch to carve the head. I left it while we ate a quick meal of sandwiches, then regarded it when I returned. Yes. I was happy with it. The features were dainty yet elegant. Like Lilja herself. The eyes were hollowed out to make room for the two dark green gems.

I glued together the two parts of the torso, sealing in the symbols. Now came the painting, but I had toyed with an idea all day. The silver pendant had lain in my pocket since yesterday, but now I took it out and held it against the doll’s chest. Should I do it? It would parallel the sign imprinted on Lilja’s skin, except it wouldn’t be a symbol of ownership, of unwanted transformation. This would be… Well, faith, hope and love. I could ask Alma and Helena’s opinions, but I was the craftsman, and I quite liked the idea.

The pendant was nearly flat, so I carved just a shallow indent to set it into, then painted each piece. The face was the hardest, but it didn’t make me as nervous as the carving because paint could be covered. A mistake or misjudgment wouldn’t set me back hours.

Helena finished the dress and set to knitting little stockings while Alma swore as she attempted to stitch together a pair of shoes with Helena’s guidance.

After dinner, hurried and simple like lunch, I glued on the pendant and the eyes, then connected all the pieces with wire. The doll was undeniably lovely, with her dark green eyes under even darker painted eyelashes.

Helena dressed her, and Alma tied the ribbon with the glass locket around her neck. The stockings were a pretty lace pattern held up with garters made from the same ribbon as the one holding the locket. Alma might have had a career as a shoemaker because the little brown leather shoes fit the doll’s feet to perfection.

“She’s very lovely,” Alma said. “But what about her hair?”

“I’ll have to think about that.”

It was late, and Alma and Helena went to bed. No reason to sneak back and forth now that my uncle knew. He knew about me too. I liked that. I would have liked to have told my father as well. We had shared everything—and yet I had never dared to tell him about that part of myself.