Dragoncrest Cliffs granny helped me take the wise route

sobeille sensed the longing, the unfairness, the injustice of a soul borne in a vessel altogether unsuitable for it.

for a while the waves crashed and the groan of stone and salt wind was all that was shared between them.

then she spoke: i don’ t’ink so. the fat seal that chased her off the black stacks came to mind. did he get reborn? what about bugs, and the fish and deer she ate to sustain her ever-hungering body. did their soul immutable find some other sphere in which to spread their golden light?

she thought of the girl on the beach, who saw worlds within worlds from an eye that must come from some other order; she saw connections where sobeille saw dead ends, a network’s stunning constellation where sobeille saw only single stars. some religions i t’ink believe dat. but i don’t. mebbe we came from dat, or our children’s children will become dem - but not us. we are stuck in de body we be born to.

another beat of waves slammed their fists across the stone they stood on. but sometimes i be lookin’ close at dem seals, and i t’ink mebbe once, we were one an’ de same a very long time ago. sobeille could not easily share how she knew this — it was in hours of carefully studying the impressive skull cayetano had given her — but it was also in other ways: watching the seals obsessively on the beach. observing their chaotic chatter. the way they rested, or reared their young. and ultimately — the same way they bleed a deep and visceral red, just like her.