"There is no such thing as bad luck," Crow said. "What some call bad luck is only luck's absence. Wherever you go, men around you are the cursed ones, not you. Your gift steals the luck they all carry with the, leaving them empty. If you knew how, you could take their luck and have it for yourself. Instead, you let it fall through your fingers like sand. that is why I laugh at you. You shake the fruit from the tree, but you leave it on the ground to rot.

— Bohagande

In 1522, young Alessandra Lucrezia Romola was baptized in a chapel in Florence. For her, life would not take its usual course. God had marked her as his instrument for the duration of her mortal years, and for all those that would follow. Her father, Pier Francesco de'Ricci, was descended from a long line of wealthy merchants and bankers, but it was her stepmother who instructed her in faith, assuming responsibilities when the girl's birth-mother died. Fiametta de Diaccetto was fascinated by Alessandra's habit of spending hours each day in solitary prayer, and did what she could to nourish the child's sense of devotion.

— Gethsemani