Vera Kest stopped the wheel with one hand and struck a peg with the other.
“Now.”
A young man turned the temporary axle. The wheel revolved without the sideways shudder that had troubled its first rotation.
Vera watched a chalk mark pass the fixed pointer.
“Again.”
The young man obeyed. A woman at the next bench wrote down the clearance, then handed him a narrow strip of cloth.
“Oil off your fingers before you touch the account.”
Lyra waited outside the work line with Felix.
