As Temeraire worked to loosen it screw by screw, either one of them might have noticed the curious effect it was having on the backplate. With each corner released, it increasingly felt as though some pressure from within was trying to push it further out; by the time the final screw is removed it would have been entirely possible for them to remove it by hand without even having to lever it out of place.

Perhaps more alarming, though, was the smell. No one could have missed the damp, earthy odour rising from the automaton and catching in throats, conspicuously organic but for the faintest tinge of rusting metal.