The sun had risen during the day and illuminated the stained glass windows of the East Tower, casting broken ribbons of color onto the floor. Melucia did not appear to notice. She sat once more in front of the mirror—unbroken this time, but reflecting an image she hardly recognized. Her once ash-gray eyes blazed with embers, as if fire had begun to make its home behind her eyes.

Behind her, unaltered and unchangeable as the movement of time, stood Seraphine.

The child had arrived without ...