I do want a sun beast. Sun beasts and their guardians were responsible for maintaining the endless summery temperature in Alorria and for beaming any excess sunlight onto crops to make them grow faster. Gaton had hatched a sun beast three years ago. His beast’s power would be fading soon—​once a storm beast finished growing to full size, it lost its ability to control the weather—​and he’d said several times that he wanted his little sister to take over his work in the local fields.

Sometimes Mina thought she’d like spending her days the way Gaton did, out in the fields, drawing in and dispersing the sun’s energy over the crops. Because of the storm beasts and their guardians, everyone in Alorria always had enough to eat. But I also want a rain beast. Or a wind beast. Flying on a wind beast would be amazing! She’d spent hours imagining herself with different kinds of beasts. All of them had a role in making Alorria great. “I’ll be happy with any kind of beast,” Mina said.

“I wanna snow beast,” Rinna announced. “So I can throw snowballs at Beon all the time.”

Mina smiled as Beon and Rinna stuck their tongues out at each other. Neither of them had ever so much as seen a snowball, but lately Mother and Papa had been telling the twins lots of tales about the different kinds of storm beasts, in preparation for Mina’s egg hatching.

Altogether, there were five kinds of storm beasts: sun, rain, wind, snow, and lightning. Any egg could hatch any kind of beast—​how the creature developed depended on the personality of the girl or boy who’d taken care of its egg. What it absorbed from them shaped how it grew. Years ago, Papa had hatched a rain beast, and Gaton had his sun beast.

Mina thought of her egg upstairs. I can’t wait to meet you! Soon she’d see which of her daydreams were going to come true. Lately, she’d been hoping for a wind beast, because she loved wind days so much—​in fact, today was a wind day: “Shouldn’t we be getting ready?” she asked when they paused for breath.

“Yes, we should! Good of you to remember,” Papa said, jolted out of his contemplation of Mina’s future. “The wind should start in about twenty minutes.”

“See?” Gaton said. “She’s responsible. Sun beast.”

“You do look out for everyone,” Papa said to Mina with a proud smile. “You’re going to be a wonderful guardian.”

“I hope so,” Mina said softly. With all my heart, I hope he’s right!

Mother clapped her hands. “Okay, let’s move!”