(eng) Mickey Zucker Reichert - Renshai Chronicles 01 by Beyond Ragnarok

Author:Beyond Ragnarok [Ragnarok, Beyond]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 23

Pudar

In my time, I’ve seen a lot of friends and loved ones die. Some of them, I had to kill myself.

—Colbey Calistinsson

Captain perched on a boulder on the island beach, one knee tucked to his chest and the other leg dangling comfortably along the cold, gray surface of the rock. The moon glittered from the red and gold highlights in his hair like tiny stars in a brown halo. The lap of the sea soothed him, music to ancient ears that missed the ceaseless roll and crash of breakers. He had sailed the Northern Sea for millennia, and it called him like a distant lover. The sea breeze carried the familiar odor of salt, a friend he had come to miss over the two centuries he lived on the solid ground of the elves’ island. Now, for the first time in longer than a hundred years, he felt truly free.

Guilt settled over him when his enjoyment grew too great, a human emotion he had learned to recognize. The freedom was artificial, the result of ignorance rather than any active solution to the problem. While he sat on the beach, the other elves grew more ponderous in their ways, more human, and their strategies continued unabated. The only thing that had changed was that he no longer knew what they plotted or did. As much as he appreciated that lull, he knew he alone benefited from it. Once, that understanding would not have entered his mind, let alone bothered him. Elves lived for the moment, doing whatever brought them joy at the time and harmed no other. They played, they laughed, they sang, and they coupled without need for or understanding of reason. That which made them happy was all that mattered.

Captain looked out over the sea, watching white water touch the shore, speckled with spindrift. The waves tumbled to the beach and receded, taking and giving in a relentless cycle. One claimed a shell, and the next would return it, sending it tumbling farther up the beach, safe until the tide waxed again. Nearest the water, the sand seemed smooth as glass, while the same sand farther up the beach grated between Captain’s toes. Longing filled him, and he dreamed awake of his ship dancing through the sea, foam spirals, lit by dawn light, curling redly in its wake. The clean salt smell tingled through his questing nostrils, and the sun bleached his hair nearly blond. The wrinkles salt and sun etched onto his face had become beloved friends he would not have traded for the supple softness of an infant.

A polite noise interrupted his reverie. Captain stiffened and turned, discovering several elves standing behind his natural seat. Moonlight glazed worried expressions across their faces, and the jerkiness of their movements suggested restlessness and discomfort. He estimated their number between six and a dozen. Most seemed young, though at least one bore scars from the fires of Ragnarok.

Captain smiled in greeting, resisting the urge to fret. It did not fit the elves of his youth, the lifestyle to which he wished he, and all of his ilk, could return.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.