Suddenly Mina wanted to flee. Run past the towers of Mytris. Sail away on the river. Or just keep flying all the way across Alorria until she reached her farm, where she could hide safely in the chicken coop.

«But Mina, the chickens smell bad.»

That surprised a laugh out of her. Well, since you put it that way, we’d better try. She thought of the moment she’d spoken up to her family and the way her fingers had sparked. It hadn’t been a coincidence that she’d been able to handle electricity on the day she’d decided she had something she wanted to say.

Pixit flew toward the cloud, then he flattened his wings, and they dove inside. The day instantly dimmed—​she couldn’t see the sun anymore, or her friends, or the ground. For one brief disorienting second, she lost track of which was up and which was down.

«Down is the way we fall,» Pixit said helpfully.

Thanks, she replied dryly. She then reached out her arms and spread her fingers. Okay, let’s do this. She felt tingling on her skin, as if a hundred feathers were tickling her.

But nothing happened.

«Keep trying.»

I am.

A few sparks jumped around them. She heard them crackling as they ran over Pixit’s wings and down to the tip of his tail. She concentrated on bringing those sparks into herself.

«How did you do it last time?»

I don’t know! she wailed. Last time she hadn’t been thinking about it. She tried to remember what she had been thinking about. Her family had been arguing, loudly, assuming as they always did that they knew what she thought and felt better than she did, and she wanted them to stop and listen to her. She’d had something important she wanted to say.

She wasn’t like other lightning guardians—​that was true—​but that didn’t mean she didn’t have things to say.

«You are a lightning guardian. You create lightning. You are the spark that can ignite the world.»

Maybe he was just saying that to make her feel better, the way he’d told her before that she was like rubber, the stuff that made lightning safe. She didn’t know if this was any more true than what he’d said then. But maybe it was. Maybe she could spark change. Hearing it in her mind, from Pixit . . . for an instant, she believed him.

And that was all it took.

I am the spark.

The lightning came to her. It swarmed over her hands, and she felt it tingle all the way up her arms. Marveling, she brought her hands together, drawing the lightning into a single ball and then stretching it out into a bolt.

“It’s beautiful,” she whispered.