"How? The Golden Magic can mend anything back together..." Beatrice says with a sort of shell-shocked frustration. The Golden Magic has never failed to mend someone or something before. How can it be that now, of all times, it fails to answer her call? There's a rising sense of panic, a sense that she is not going to survive this. She's trembling a little, and Ange can feel it--the fear, the anxiety. At least for just now, Beatrice is another scared young girl. All things considered, she's (physically) even younger than Ange now. She takes a breath, ignoring that she should be breathing seawater.

"I don't know. I was--I handled some of the artifacts that were brought back up from down here earlier and then--I didn't think it was important. I don't know why that would have anything to do with this!" She holds out one scaled, gray arm and shakes it furiously, her voice rising into one of her angry shrieks for a moment as emotion threatens to overwhelm her.

"It can't have corrupted me that much! Not down to the center! I'm the Golden Witch!" She's getting emotional again, and she can feel something in her chest threatening to bubble up and overtake her. She swallows, trying to force it back downwards with a desperate clench of fists. She closes her eyes tight for a moment, trembles. Then her eyes flicker open and she stares at Ange with wide eyes.

"I'm--" She swallows again. This time her pride.

"I'm frightened, Ange."