And when Ellard tried to talk her out of it, frightened for her in a way that six years of not-knowing had sharpened to a point, she told him something he never forgot.

She said that for six years she had been powerless — that the worst part of the dark had not been the fear or the hunger but the helplessness, the sense of being something done-to rather than a person who could act.

Going back in with the wire was the first thing in six years that was hers to choose.

It would let her be the one who ended it, rather than one more thing that was ended for her.

He could not argue with that.

He understood it too well.