Gentle and half-mad, she fed on a diet of whispers. She was lonely in that way couldn’t be fixed— like a porcelain doll that had been broken and glued back together too many times retain the right silhouette.

She was a fighter. But eventually, even the best catch lousy luck— and ever since she turned twenty, she hadn’t been rid of it.

It can be hidden for a time. Charmed or bluffed away. Creating these small pockets of reality where the tiniest motes of light entered her world.