Dark Moon, Shallow Sea by David R. Slayton

Author:David R. Slayton [Slayton, David R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing

Chapter 23

Moon

The Ino drifted in open, glassy water, her sails furled, her anchor dropped. The sea lay as still as it ever was, but Raef rocked as though he’d been hit by a storm.

He missed Maurin with a sudden fierceness. She would have known what to make of this, and probably would’ve made some crass joke. Her blunt manner always helped him sort his thoughts.

He had a father. He had a parent, alive, and he’d been nowhere nearby when Raef had needed him.

The crew had abandoned the deck. Raef circled it and found Kinos standing near the prow, staring out across the water, toward the east, toward his island.

Raef almost walked away. He could climb to the crow’s nest, give himself the chance to untangle the ball of barbed feelings writhing in his guts.

A father would have meant everything during his years on the streets, and a noble father? He needn’t have starved. He needn’t have eaten garbage. He needn’t have felt so utterly alone.

But he was grown now. He didn’t know what sort of relationship they could have.

Kinos stared east as Raef approached, his green eyes so intent, like he might leap overboard and start swimming toward home.

“What are you doing out here?”

“Waiting for you,” Kinos said without turning. “How did it go?”

Raef did not know what to say, how to explain, or if he even wanted to try.

He’d meant what he’d told Kinos on their way to the Garden. Phoebe’s tower had been his home, her priests and children had been his family. Only during his worst punishments, the most boring of them, or the hardest nights after, had he fantasized about the life he could have led, the food he would have eaten, if he hadn’t been gifted to the goddess.

It had happened how it had happened. Cormac had thought him dead and sailed away.

“You were right,” Raef said. “He wants me to stay.”

“And will you?” Kinos asked.

He still hadn’t looked at Raef, and Raef was glad for it.

In time he could make peace with it, with what had been and what could have been. It would not be tonight, but some night, sometime, it would not hurt.

Raef moved to stand beside Kinos at the railing. Had there been a hymn for when the moonlight made a silver road atop the waves? He could not remember one, but perhaps, just maybe, he’d have the chance to write one someday.

“No,” he said. “Not right now. I promised to get you home, and I will.”

“You don’t . . .” Kinos trailed off. His chin dipped toward his chest. “Thank you.”

“Tell me about it,” Raef said, trying to make a joke of it and knowing he failed. “Tell me about what I’m giving all this up for.”

“Eastlight isn’t a big place. We get people passing through, sailing between Delia and Aegea, but no one really stops there. There are olive trees. We shake them in the fall and press the oil. There are grapes, closer to town. There’s almost nowhere that you can’t see the ocean.

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