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“They scream,” she had insisted, “as surely as any hawk soaring upon the thermals. “Whatever their names, whatever their pasts, Mother; they scream and cry and wail in the night, and they keep me from my sleep with the sharp sound of their terrors.” She spoke calmly, though of fright, and while the dark circles spread beneath her eyes they remained as bright and sharp as those of her Mother’s guardians.

Mother considered a moment, eyeing Aramina from behind her yellowing veil before she spoke. “Such girls are coal-strong,” she whispered, “and must burn or turn to diamond. Tell me, Ara, which would you be? Would you give light in your death … or in your power?”