The storm has brought Ulla to the cold shelter of the northern islands, to the darkened caves and flat black pools where she remains to this day, waiting for the lonely, the ambitious, the clever, the frail, for all those willing to strike a bargain. She never waits for long.

A thousand desperate wishes have been spoken on these shores, and in the end they were all the same: Make me someone new.

When you wish out loud, magic happens

Perhaps a wish was just a hope with better aim.

When had she stopped being a child? The first time a guy whistled at her out of a car window when she was walking to school? The moment she started wondering how she looked when she ran, what jiggled or bounced, instead of the pace she was setting? The first time she'd kept from raising her hand because she didn't want to seem too smart or too eager? No one had sung? No one had told her how much she would lose until the time for grieving was long over.

But hope rises like water trapped by a dam, higher and higher, in increments that mean nothing until you face the flood.