"Yes." It's an odd space to tell the whole story in and in the same way almost perfect, because Gela has something to do with her hands while she talks; she sinks them both into the dirt in earnest now and begins to scoop a weed out, collecting roots with the dirt and sifting them out with her fingers.

"Okay." Okay. Her voice is still quiet, mostly steady. "The first time — the only time I've ever turned, it was against my will. Somebody from the Mortalitasi changed me into one using magic and I don't really know why." They talked to her about it that day they brought her back into herself but everything was blurred and so confusing. She doesn't remember it well: only the taste of blood in her mouth and an urge to run. "But I was stuck that way for a long time. And I wasn't myself, I had no control."

She's pulled up some plant with the weed. Hastily she untangles, pushes the plant back down into the spot where it was and cups dirt around it, tamps it back down. "There were others. I wasn't the only one he experimented with. I think there was," she shuts her eyes tight suddenly, "Three or maybe four."