The ashes in the fireplace stirred more heavily than usual. When the flames flickered, they brought not only light but constantly shifting shadows, making the room feel warm while making the wind seeping through the window cracks feel even colder.
The silver knitting needles in her hands seemed to be stitching shut wounds that had nearly been forgotten. Those days that could not be avoided in conversation no longer had any room left to split open and bleed, leaving only heavy black scabs like fireplace ash.
"...I don't know if you've heard of the Sonderkommando. It sounds like some position in the Boy Scouts, and in fact, it was much the same. They preferred to have children do it, watching them numbly drag corpses out of the gas chambers and burn them without a trace of attachment."
When the soft click of a lighter sounded, the red-haired woman had already put down her knitting needles. The man who had been speaking turned his head, and his wife smiled at him. "I think I can take this chance to go upstairs and sleep for a while, can't I?"
"Of course, Magda," he said. "When you wake up, freshly dried daisies will be by your bedside. Sweet dreams."
"That must have been a terrible memory for you." Schiller took the cigarette from his hand and called him by his current name. "Magnus."
As smoke drifted upward, the young Magneto leaned back against his chair. "When it happened early enough, it became a life with its own patterns, not some disaster. Only after leaving that environment did you realize you had been wounded and bleeding."
"Was that your experience?"
"Yes. I didn't think any of it was cruel. Carrying bodies out of the gas chambers was work I did in exchange for food.