[He's strong. Of course he's strong, impossibly strong, because that's what they're like. These ones. She remembers. She remembers being one. She remembers giving up any strength she had for herself and taking on the strength he wanted for her to have.]

[She remembers the pain of turning. She remembers the pain of dying and turning again. She remembers, and she twists the half-coil up under his ribs as she remembers, and she looks sorry, she really does. Sorry but stone-faced.]

Come to my assistance in this great need, [she says, quiet and steady, pushing up,] that I may receive the consolation and succor of heaven in all my tribulations, necessities, and sufferings.