On the day before Ide Noapte's fourteenth birthday, she is greeted at school by Phyre Tynan, a girl who is visiting for the day. Phyre is cold and distant, and Ide's attempts at friendship are futile; but Ide suspects that something about Phyre is "different"-sort of like everyone else in her small town of Naturalleies. Taking place over the course of twenty-four hours, this is Ide and Phyre's account of a day that changed their perceptions of the world around them-a day when the girls discover that, no matter how bad life gets, there is always a flame at the end of the passage.