A walk that would have taken her seconds once now was a handful of moments for each tiny leg of it, stopping to replenish herself.

"Now," the new conductor said once they were tuned, offering a smile that promised infinite secrets. "We begin."

Every new shore was the same: a blue expanse conjoined to unyielding volcanic stone, wreathed in a furious margin of foam.

My master keeps my memories in a carved stone box tucked in a pocket of his silver-foam coat.