You are your daughter’s only parent, in a medieval kingdom living under the blessing of its volcano goddess. Her mother is gone. Everything from here — what she studies, what she practises, who she is allowed to know — is your decision.

Her childhood is a schedule you set. She can be enrolled at one of the kingdom’s four colleges to study music, take up painting, or train in martial arts and combat; she can be put to a trade; or she can be left to her own devices. Attention shows in who she becomes, and so does neglect.

When she comes of age she can pledge to one of the three lords of the land, taking on their work and building a name among the noble houses. The Birdie Festival is where everything she has learned is put in front of an audience. Older things lie buried in the canyon, for anyone willing to go and look.

She might end up a credit to the kingdom, an unremarkable citizen of it, or something the kingdom would rather forget.