For five years, the fate-thread had been her anchor, a constant reminder that no matter how hard life became—her parents’ death, their struggling finances, the sorrow she could see in her sisters’ eyes—there was something waiting for her, a thread blazing silver against the horizon. One day, it would come, and one day, she would be happy. It was fate, impossible and otherworldly and utterly hers. No, she wouldn’t cut it.
