Wheeling Gull Isle when she strut, she got (body and blood)

She laughed. The sound held no color, no warmth--but she laughed. "My mother did that, too," Maegi said, the frown diminishing somewhat as she peered curiously at Reed. She didn't think it was common, for parents to abandon their young like Potema had; perhaps she was wrong. At least she now felt a sort of kinship between her and the ruddy girl, something she hadn't felt before.

Maegi shrugged, affecting coolness. "I lived in a forest," she said simply. "My brothers went off with my father to find someone; when they didn't return, I went looking for them. I got captured and. . ." Here she trailed off, her heart thumping slightly in her chest. She didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to revisit it, not when the wounds were so freshly healed--

--to speak the words aloud would be to rip them open once again. "Well, I'm here now, I guess," the young priestess said abruptly, shrugging. She looked at Reed. "Have you been here all your life?" The girl walked with such poise, such grace, on the beach, that Maegi thought it must be so.