5
When I was a little girl in Harane, I believed in magic. In wishing on stars, fairies that danced in the moonlight, and beautiful spells made to save the world.
I learned very young that the sort of magic in stories does not exist.
I didn’t know until much later that the sort of magic that does survive in Ilbrea is both more wondrous than fairies and more terrifying than Death’s own axe.
Still, there was something about witnessing magic that always took me a little off guard. Like I was a character who had fallen into the wrong story. My tale was that of an orphan from a small village. A girl who was destined to watch everyone around her die until it was her turn for the grave.
Somehow, I had ended up in a saga of bravery, murder, and magic.
I had spent the last four months ferryin
