Yeah, the 'she alone' part isn't exactly true, but she's the first person Lambert's actually told himself, so that's special enough. Even if that winking doesn't exactly give Lambert a lot of faith that he won't wake up tomorrow and find out the whole carnival knows about them, but Lambert can't bring himself to mind too much right now.

"Thanks." He gives her a slightly less sardonic smile, and though he won't reach out and hold Childermass's hand or anything like that, he'll stay close for a while, until duty or some other aspect of nightrunner business inevitably calls him away again. It'll be like that for the rest of the night -- at one point, he'll even lapse into a meditative trance just to replenish some energy -- but though the magician's condition doesn't change one bit, there's at least some relief to be found in knowing there's someone who can understand why this matters to Lambert.

Then early in the morning, the Ringmaster returns, and Lambert can't stay. He sets out a healing draught with instructions for Peridot to offer it to Childermass if he wakes, touches his fingers to the magician's shoulder once, looking down at him.

And then he's gone.