‘Not much choice,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘You were out. None of the others made it. Dread was absolutely worthless.’

‘Dreadaeleon? He’s alive?’

‘Fished both of you out. You were unconscious. He wasn’t. Had him make a raft with his ice … breath … magic-thing.’ He gestured to the beach. ‘Floated here. He stalked off to the forest shortly after, never came back out.’

She followed his finger to the dense patch of foliage over her head, saw the scrawny figure leaning against a tall tree, in such still repose as to appear dead. Perhaps he was, she thought with a twinge of panic.

‘Gods,’ she muttered. ‘What’s the matter with him?’

‘What isn’t?’

‘You didn’t check?’ She turned to him, aghast. ‘You didn’t ask?’

‘Not the healer.’ The rogue sneered. ‘I couldn’t watch over bothof you, and you were the one with breasts. Process of elimination.’

‘How delightful,’ she muttered. ‘I suppose since I’m awake now …’ She made to rise, then paused as she became aware of a sudden pain in her cheek. She winced, pressing her hand to her jaw. ‘My face hurts.’

‘Yeah,’ he grunted, scratching his chin. ‘I’ve been hitting you for the past few days.’

She could but blink.

‘All right … should I ask?’

‘I’ve seen you do it before. Seemed like an easy medical process.’

‘You hit people who are in shock, idiot.’

‘I was a bit startled.’

She sighed, rubbing her eyes. When she looked up again, an unsympathetic sea met her gaze with the uninterested rumble of waves.

‘Lost everything?’ she repeated dully.

‘Does it somehow make it more believable if I say it three times?’ Denaos sighed. ‘Yes, lost everything, up to and including the derelict reptile that got us here.’

‘And Lenk, and Kataria …’ She sighed, placing her face in her hands and staring glumly out over the sea. ‘It …’ She winced, or rather, forced a wince to her face. ‘It had to happen, I suppose.’

‘It did,’ Denaos grunted, casting her a curious eye. ‘I’m shocked you’re taking it so well, though. One would expect you to be all on knees and hands, cutting your forehead for Talanas and praying for their safe return … or at least safe passage to heaven.’

She scratched the spot her pendant had hung. ‘Maybe it’s not so necessary these days.’

‘Gods are always necessary,’ he replied. ‘Especially in cases like these.’

She said nothing at that, instead letting the full weight of the words sink upon her. Lost everything … everything …

‘The tome,’ she gasped suddenly, turning to the rogue. ‘The tome! Did you at least look for it?’

‘Did,’ Denaos grunted, then gestured up the hill to Dreadaeleon. ‘Or hedid, rather. Used some kind of weird bird magic that didn’t work before running off like a milksop. Useless.’

That thought plucked an uncomfortable string on her heart. She should have been more upset about the loss of her companions, she knew. But somehow, the loss of the book carried more weight. It seemed to her that the loss of the tome, merely the topmost piece in a growing pile of disappointments, was just a spiteful afterthought to drive home the pointlessness of it all.

It was for nothing. It was futile.

Those thoughts were becoming easier to endure with their frequency.

She looked up at a hand placed on her shoulder, doing her best not to cringe at his unpleasant smile.

‘Losing faith?’ he asked.

‘I didn’t know faith concerned you.’

‘Washed up on an island. No food, little water, friends dead and book lost.’ He shrugged. ‘Not much left but faith.’

She frowned; faith used to be all she needed. Somehow, Denaos seemed to sense that thought, however. He rose up, offering her a hand and a whisper.

‘I’m sorry.’

It came back on a flood of sensation, images carried on the stink of his breath, sounds in the warmth of his grasp.

‘ I’m sorry.’ It was his voice that slipped through her memory, clear and concise, stored in the fog of her mind. And he repeated it, over and over. ‘ I’m sorry, I’m sorry … but why? Why does this always happen to me?’

Was it merely an echo? An errant thought emerging from her subconscious? She had been unconscious, she knew, sleeping. She couldn’t have heard him. But, then, why did his voice continue to ring out in her mind?

‘ This is the second one,’ he had said, she was certain. ‘ I didn’t even do anything this time! It’s not fair! Firsther, then … her.’ She could remember a hand, lovingly brushing against her cheek. ‘ Please, Silf, Talanas …any of you! I deserve it, I know, but she doesn’t! Andshe didn’t! Please. Please, I’m sorry, I’m sorry …’

‘Who was she?’ The question came from her mouth unbidden on the tail of that sporadic voice that rose from her mind.

‘What?’ He hesitated pulling her up, looking down at her. The mask shattered completely, crumbled in thick, white shards onto the sand. What was left behind was something hard-eyed and purse-lipped. ‘What did you say?’

‘She … the woman you were speaking of.’ Asper pulled herself the rest of the way up. ‘You kept apologising.’

‘No, I didn’t.’ He let his hand fall from hers. ‘How would you even know? You were out.’

‘I remember, though. I must have been awake for part of it, and-’

‘No, you weren’t.’ He cut her off with a razor edge. ‘ Iwatched over you. Youwere out and you didn’twake up, at any time.’ He turned away from her curtly. ‘I’m going to go sleep myself now. Go check on Dread.’

She watched him take all of three steps before the words came again.

‘For what it’s worth,’ she said, ‘I’m sure she forgives you.’

He turned upon her with the staggering need of a beggar two weeks starved. Considering her through expressionless eyes for a moment, he walked toward her, arms up in benediction. With more confusion than hesitation, she let herself into his embrace. There was no warmth in his arms, but an unpleasant constrictor tightness.

She gasped as she felt the knife, sliding like a snake up her tunic to kiss her kidneys with steel lips, the menace of the weapon conveyed in a touch that barely grazed her skin.

‘ You,’ he whispered, his voice an unsharpened edge, ‘don’t everspeak of her.’

‘You …’ She swallowed hard. ‘You said you didn’t have any knives left. You lied.’

‘No,’ he gasped, looking at her with mock incredulousness. ‘ Me?’

And in a flash, he was striding away from her. His back was tall and straight, shaking off his threat like a cloak. It fell atop the shards of his mask, and as she stared at his back, mouth agape, she couldn’t help but feel that he was already weaving another one to put on.

A warm breeze blew across the beach. The sun was silent. Her left arm began to ache.

After much careful deliberation, a lone seagull drifted down off the warm currents crisscrossing the island to land upon the sands and peck at the earth. In its simple mind, it vaguely recalled not visiting this area before. It was a barren land, bereft of much food. But in its simple eyes, it beheld all manner of debris not seen on these shores before. And thus, curious, it hopped along, picking at the various pieces of wood.

A shadow caught its attention. It looked up. It remembered these two-legged things, such as the one that sat not far away from it. It remembered it should run from them. It spread its wings to fly.

And instantly, it was seized in an invisible grip.

‘No, no,’ Dreadaeleon whispered, pulling his arm back. The force that gripped the seagull drew it closer to him, the bird’s movement completely wrenched up in panic. ‘I need your brain.’

His voice was hot with frustration. He hadn’t expected it to take nearly this long to seize a stupid bird that, by all accounts, should be infesting the shores like winged rats. But that was a momentary irritation, one quickly overrun by the sudden pain that lanced through his bowels.