The forest was quiet. It was just before dawn; the trees were usually alive with crickets and birdsong, while leaves on the forest floor rustled underfoot of deer and rodents, waking up with the sun to begin the day's foraging. But every animal in the vicinity had fled, leaving an eerie silence so deep that a momentary gentle breeze sounded like the onset of a terrible storm. The only creature making any noise at all was the girl, kneeling on the muddy ground, and she was crying.

Before her was a second, younger girl, who lay motionless in a heap of mud and ash. If she was breathing, it was too slight to be detectable; only a sudden involuntary twitch of her left hand, covered in blood and blackened flesh, signified that she was alive. Noticing this sign of vitality, the older girl jolted upright. She grabbed a few strands of her long, crimson hair, and tried to wipe the grime away from the child's lips. Then she did breathe – a weak, anguished breath, but a breath nonetheless. A brief expression of joy and relief flashed across the redhead's face, before she broke back down into tears.

A twig snapped from several feet away as the man approaching them stopped in his tracks. "My God, what have you done?" he murmured.

The girl choked back a sob. "It...it was an accident...I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I would never..." She buried her face in her hands. "Please, she's still alive, you have to do something..."

The man strode over to them, kicking a charred stick out of his path. He knelt beside the unconscious child and spent several seconds examining her injuries. "Most of her torso is badly burned, obviously. But the burn appears to be quite shallow. I doubt there's any damage to her lungs or heart. If we can get her to medicine quickly, I think your sister will survive."

The redhead rose slowly to her feet, shaking so heavily that she could very well have fallen over at any moment. "Take her to the village. Help her. Please."

"Of course I'll help her." The man fixed his stare on the older girl and meaningfully extended his hand forward. "But right now, I'm just as concerned about helping you."

"No!" she cried, scurrying backward. "Don't come any closer, I don't want to hurt you too."

The man walked toward her undeterred. "You won't hurt me, Camilla. I've been around you long enough to know that you can control yourself when you put your mind to it."

Camilla shook her head violently, sending droplets of mud and tears flying in all directions. "How can you say that? Look at what I've done...I can't control it, I've spent every waking moment of my life trying to control it, I was so sure I could do it that I stopped wearing the gloves, and now...and now this..."

"You can," the man said, taking another step forward. "I've been worrying about you as of late. I always thought that the way that you tried to keep your powers at bay by pretending they didn't exist was counterproductive, to say the least. And it looks like I was right."

She opened her mouth a crack, but no words came out.

"But I have a plan, Camilla. I know a much different tactic to control your ability. And if you'll heed it, I'm confident that you can beat this curse once and for all."

Camilla took a deep, agonized breath. "I just...I just don't want to hurt any more people."

"You've done a terrible thing to your sister. But it was as accident, a momentary lapse in judgment. Put your trust in me, and I promise that this will be the last time you ever harm an innocent person." He strode up to her and outstretched his arm once again. "Do you trust me?"

She gingerly raised her hand to meet his, pressing two of her fingers against his palm. "Of course. Of course I trust you."

"Good." He smiled at her for a moment, then turned his gaze to the prostrate figure beside them. "We've got to get her down to the village. When she wakes up, she will be in a great deal of pain. I need you to gather as much snow as you can to keep her wounds iced."

Camilla was still visibly trembling, but she dutifully removed her shawl and began shoveling handfuls of snow and slush into it. That inexplicable winter storm in the middle of summer had ended several days before, but its remnants were still scattered about the ground in little piles, shielded from the blazing sun by the forest canopy. She then returned to the man, who was wrapping his coat around as much of child's burned body as he could.

"I'm sorry," she whispered to her unconscious sister. "I'm so, so sorry."

The man rose with the child cradled in his arms. "There will time for apologies later. Let's go."

They walked away, and the unnatural silence of the forest returned. The animals would creep back to the scene and resume their normal activity within a few hours, but it would be several summer rainfalls before the scorched earth on the forest floor was finally washed away.