She was too young for death and sleep and peace.

Life called and claimed and demanded.

It had need of the young for a good spring, a ripe summer, a golden autumn.
She must live and work and justify.
But how?
There was Gilbert watching the stars with a smile, calmly and quietly and horribly waiting for her to make a choice, having slipped over on the other side of the dividing line.

A scream of fear and terror rose to her throat.

This quiet, exalted man, so gentle and determined, with the look in his eyes of one who intended to own one way or the other--Live?
How was she to live?
He had given her a choice between something that was impossible and something that all Nature held her back from.