It's true Avi was afraid. He knew the Char was cruel, but that what lay below it would be worse. He feared losing himself in the dark. But still he went forward to the place Hama Sula marked for him, and he stood on the edge of the pit. It had been formed in the days before the Char ate the sky, you see, and the Watchers had left their digging gear behind. Hama Sula knew knew this, and she told her son what to do.

And because he was Avi, who would become the Stormbreaker, he swallowed his fear and walked into the dark.

[ Hama leans in closer. ]

The earth shook when he climbed down. Avi called out to Hama Sula and said he was afraid. Hama Sula called back to him and told him this was good, because only the living know fear and this was proof he was not yet a ghost. And so he went deeper and deeper, calling back to Hama Sula and listening as she directed him; first to the fuel, and then to the iron. It took him all day and all night to bring it all back up, but he did it.

And then, together, mother and son fixed Hama Sula's machine, and set out across the Char.