Lilith's Tears

Lilith’s Tears

By David Jones

Copyright 2011 David Jones

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold

or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person,

please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did

not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to

Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work

of this author.

PART ONE: THE STOLEN ROSE

Prelude

Silence, silence, and he lay there. The island stirred.

The ship cut like a swan through placid ocean surface, leaving in its wake a long white gash of waves, expanding outwards before disappearing back to unbroken depths. Above, the summer sun beamed out, enthroned in a clear sky. Not a single cloud drifted by to hinder this sunlight, as it danced upon the sea, glittering and across the gentle undulations. All was calm, all was impossibly serene. The warm light of the tropics breathed new life into summer, and only the faintest of breezes stirred to fill the vessel’s sails, sighing against canvas, carrying the ship forward slowly, unhurriedly across this millpond. With no sight of land on either side, and indeed no land for hundreds of miles if their charts and measurements served them correctly, the scene was one of overwhelming blue, with both sea and sky stretching on forever until they merged, clumsily colliding in the far distance and tumbling off the horizon in the heat haze, indistinguishable from each other. There was great peace in such isolation, and with the sea so gentle, so caressing, there was scarcely any noise save for the quiet rustling of sails and the soft, rushing creak of water being parted lazily by damp timber. Time slid by as if in a dream, meaningless in this vast expanse of open water. It seemed as though the vessel, dwarfed by the enormity of emptiness around it, was suspended somehow in the middle, with the endless sky stretching up above, and the bottomless fathoms unfolding away beneath. Yet on they sailed, carving a path of spreading ripples across the surface. Captain Trebane stood at the bow of his ship, perched precariously with one foot resting on the stem, clutching some rigging to secure himself against the gaping drop underneath, holding the ancient, knotted rope firmly in one raised hand...

****

Namely, that these waters are cursed.

Trebane laughed aloud. Once again, safety, security in his position, coupled with tremendous relief swept, over him in a liberating wave. Fear could so easily grow to be the decay at the soul of a crew, gnawing away at hearts, minds until only the basest instincts of violence remained, reigning supreme to manifest itself in rebellions and bloody murder. Or so the old tales said. But not these fears. The fear of pirates, starvation or dwindling water supplies drove crews to frightful, reckless mutiny, not hollow, empty superstitions. Surely, he thought, amongst rational people, such foolish soothsaying could gain no credence, present no threat to the stability of his vessel.

And how are these waters said to be cursed? he asked, half laughing, looking back at the huge map sprawled across his desk.

He seems to believe, or at least claims to believe, that there is a landmass, a landmass afflicted by a curse...

Look, interrupted Trebane, deeming it best to impose an immediate end to fanciful daydreaming. He drummed his fingers on the chart. Great care had been taken to plot the course of the voyage, and a pair of compasses lay entwined at the side of the map, tributes to the accuracy of his measurements.

We are here, he was resolute, raising his eyes to study Regar’s reaction There is no land for miles, cursed or otherwise....

****

Someone was playing a harmonica with exquisite, deft skill, and the notes danced through the air, soaring like living beings, spirits as they rose and fell, drifting tenderly towards him, gliding through the warmth of summer, playing, singing their softest of lullabies around his ears. The tune filled him with a sense of the distant faraway, an almost dreamlike song of rolling hills, crystal rivers and deep, mysterious forests - a fantasy of daydreams, and he found himself utterly captivated, enthralled by the melody. Within it, though, were the faint tones of mourning, the slightest hint of sharp sorrow, slipping as a single tear into a giant, gaping ocean. As the music played on, Trebane was increasingly lost within its tones, until he was completely absorbed, and it echoed with a strange resonance in his very soul. Each note flooded his senses - a subtle charm conjuring forth the emotions, the happiness, the hope of days long since past. This weaving enchantment summoned his memories, and, as he leaned against the rail, his mind drifted far, far away, so that he left the ship, the sea, to dwell again within those old days, and they lived, existed once more. Longing passed over him; a great, silent wave sweeping clean a beach. The sudden rush of feeling was so immediately potent that it appeared initially rootless, nothing but a surge of emotion with no real origin. Gradually, though, the feelings found clarity, defining themselves slowly, shifting within, until they began to fix themselves to something, anchor their haze to a certain innocence, a time of...

****

Good! she smiled I love the climate here, its peaceful, more peaceful than the city, at least.

They had met first in the city, several months before the Stolen Rose would leave port. Numerous negotiations to carry her, along with her small circle of companions, as passengers on what was, essentially, a cargo vessel, had swirled as a fog around him, filling the captain with all manner of trepidation. The seas were dangerous, even if this was not a vessel built for battle, sometimes battle was unavoidable, for they could come under attack from pirates, assaults from foreign navies or simply be destroyed without trace by some great storm. In times of such crisis, he would have preferred each person on board to be a hardened, professional sailor, and would have taken great comfort in that knowledge, but, upon meeting her for the first time, he had been captivated, and thus torn. While her safety had jarred in the foreground of his thoughts, he found his heart gradually rise to overpower his better judgement. For days, he wandered aimlessly about the city, seeking open spaces, freedom from his concern, a place where he could revel in his new found excitement for the future. Even now, that lost period of time was akin to a dream: late summer, or perhaps early autumn, when September kept alive the summer’s glow, but set the sun lower in the sky, so that it cast ripe, golden light across the earth. A warm autumn, he smiled, reminiscing, until November had brought the cold, the frosts in a sudden rush of frigid air. October had breathed mists to hover low over the fields, the world had taken on a whole new beauty as the magic of that September echoed on, stretching: eternal. He had been as if in a waking, living, fantasy– a Renaissance. His rational judgement thus numbed, made redundant by the strange, new intoxication, he had simply voiced his concerns as truthfully as was possible and stepped away, permitted the final decision to be made by the shipping company, governed, of course, by her father. Now here they were.

You are enjoying the sea, I take it? he laughed, turning to face her, watching as honey curls were lifted gently by that faint sea breeze...

****

Night had cooled the air too. While there was still only the slightest of breezes, the sun’s assault had ceased, replaced now by a fresher, more tolerable temperature. All at once he was at peace again, with those disturbing visions of chaotic half sleep long forgotten.

From behind, the deck creaked and he jumped, turning around in surprise, only to see Serena strolling towards him.

"Good evening! he beamed, pleased that, if he should have any company on this most pleasant of nights, it should be hers.

It’s sweltering below deck, she sighed, joining him at the side, relishing the caressing cool of the night air as she gazed up at the copper moon.

I know, replied Trebane, tracking her gaze, his eyes also falling upon the luminescence in the sky, But this is a wonderful night.

For a time, they were both silent, basking in the glow of moonlight, the stars with all their twinkling, flickering grins, and the aura of tranquillity. What limits could there be? The universe was unfolding above, reaching out forever.

What will you do? she broke the silence finally, her voice composed of a softness very much akin to the floating pillars of silver light,

When we return to the city?

That is some time away, he laughed.

Having scarcely devoted any thoughts to his future beyond this particular voyage, Trebane was filled with a sudden dread that these happy days would, at some point in time, have an end cruelly imposed upon them. Yet he dismissed the thought as quickly as it had arrived, giving it no more than a split second’s consideration, driving the concern firmly to the very pit of his mind, for here he was, and happiness was here.

I expect I will receive my payment and continue sailing, somewhere else, why?

Will you always sail?

I feel bound to the sea, he said thoughtfully. Pondering such a question was especially difficult as the future was such a faraway prospect, hardly even real. He found it almost unimaginable that one day all of this would find its conclusion.

But one day I shall have to stop, everybody does in the end, I imagine.

She nodded sagely, and he contemplated, for a brief moment, a life on land, what shape a future would take, but he could not imagine it...

****

The cloud bank had finally caught up with them, looming up at a terrifyingly close proximity. Gigantic, bubbling mushrooms swelled upwards into the sky, bulging outwards as if they were set to explode, rupture at any moment, and yet they retained their power, so strong, so stark - mountains of a thousand towering peaks. No longer the faraway, distant prospect of the previous day, no longer the fluffy, benevolent white that could so easily have dissipated to nothingness, they had grown considerably more threatening, shifting and changing colour, capturing the fleeing rays of sunlight and holding them in an iron grip. Such was the complex metamorphosis bursting above, the ever changing concoction of hues, that Trebane could not help but imagine how some great artist could craft a masterpiece from all of this, as the light of the day collided with the cloud, was trapped, and transformed. Some were tinted on the underside with a subtle blue, which slowly dyed itself an increasingly deep grey, while those leering peeks wept metallic irons into flowering slopes, so that all became a sorrowful mingling of mournful greys and poisoned blues. Pervading it all, though, was the impenetrable pitch black of certain pools, isolated spots that were, even now, bleeding freely into the greys, as if they had stolen some of the night and held it within themselves to defy the sun. These specks seemed darker than the night itself.

Trebane gulped, dwarfed by the sight of what expanded before him. A vicious, whipping gale was howling about the deck and the sea, as if acting as herald to the might of the mustering storm, and the sea had grown rougher than ever. He found himself gripping the rail as the ship reared up, dizzying, only to crash down again with a heavy, spattering splash. Looking up, it appeared as though the sky had been carved in two, one side filled with tumultuous, bleak foreboding, the other half still defended by a blue sky marshalled to protect and preserve its sunlight. In this battle the storm was prevailing, slithering towards the sun, the ship, casting a long, rippling shadow across the ocean surface, reaching out with long fingers, reaching, groping for them, ready to consume the fragile, timber frame.

Sir, Regar appeared from nowhere, everything is secured, as you ordered...

****

Serena answered at once, opening the door and ushering him inside. Evidently, she had endeavoured to secure everything in her room against the onslaught of the storm, having removed all the various trinkets from the desk top, taken the mirror from her dressing table and generally made the chamber as sparse as possible. He found himself all the more endeared to her for the effort, and he cast his eye across the rolling, square room with its wooden walls, wooden furniture and wooden bed, despairing, wishing that he could do something, anything to hold the storm back from her.

Be careful of this, he said instead, rocking the wardrobe back and to. When the...when the time comes...

****

Good luck, he attempted to smile, but, overwrought as he was, he could not summon it.

Here, she removed from her neck a small golden anchor, hanging upon a silver chain, and handed it to him:

I have been told this brings good fortune.

Thank you, he smiled and took the chain, silently contemplating how, even though he had no faith, no belief in superstitions of this nature, this trinket at least would be of some comfort.

Once again, the silence returned, and the rain seemed to intensify, as if glutted upon the quietude between them. However, time had elapsed, and was indeed hurtling by, and he felt the urge to hurry. As he moved to the door, she stopped him again.

Tomorrow, she said gravely, I will see you again?

Of course.

As he closed the door, the sound echoed down the corridor, reverberating off the walls so he heard it recur again and again…

****

Main sail! he bellowed. Everyone was screaming, stumbling and grabbing at anything as wave after gigantic wave crashed over them. In the madness, the sudden, cruel upheaval from the calm, nothing was right – the dashing, desperate figures, the ear splitting cacophony, all lit up by striking, jagged lightning.

Secure the main sail! again, roaring out against the solid wall of noise, his mouth filling with salt water, choking, gasping, bent double as the spray foamed in his airways. Yet someone had found his voice, for in the next lightning flash, now so close that it came almost on top of the thunderclap, figures stumbled, slipping, fumbling to the mast, and grappled to secure the main sail as it billowed free, fluttering a stark, ghostly white against the canvas of black. He watched the men struggle, fighting bitterly as the gale and the sea snapped at them. A colossal, rending streak of lightning tore down, and, in the momentary flash, stooped figures bent against the strain, gaunt in their grunting effort, the sail lashing in their faces.

Suddenly the thunder came louder than ever, so loud that he instinctively released his grip on safety to shield his ears, and instantaneously a mighty flash of lightning forked down in a twisted, white scar, colliding with the mast so that both exploded into a cloud of fiery red sparks. Trebane, displaced by gushing water, watched as the central mast split clean in two, shattered by the strike from above, and, with a sickening, splintering crunch fell to the deck in flames. Men scattered, throwing themselves recklessly to the side as the burning piece of timber, flaring like a beacon, came clattering down, smashing through the captain’s own quarters. For a few seconds the entire ship blazed, relentless, the felled mast aflame as a huge candle, dispelling the darkness. Trebane felt clarity return, albeit for the briefest of stays. Basked in a flickering light of orange, he saw the distress around him refracted into writhing shadows, contorted shapes in the glow of the inferno. All at once it was gone, though, as another great wave swept over them, dragging the billowing timber into a consuming sea, plunging them all into darkness again: a terrifying darkness of hurtling, haphazard speed. They were taking on vast amounts of water, too, perhaps gallons below deck, and if the sheer strength of nature alone was not enough to dash the ship to pieces, they would sink regardless...

Bail the water out! he roared, rational thought returning, as if the torch had awoken his mind, the sense of his own authority flooding back to him. Those in the immediate vicinity appeared to hear the order, and fell about at once to find anything capable of sending the swirling waters back to the sea...

****

Man overboard! screamed the captain, man overboard!!

Filled with a reckless disregard for himself, he fell forwards, keeping low against the fury of a world striving for his obliteration, hating itself, venting its rage against the ship, and his hand found the rail.

Regar! but he was staring howling oblivion in the face, gazing into a boiling sea of waves, hurling themselves up, over, to suck in the life. The vessel lurched again, violent, precarious, forcing his face into the waves. It was over, finally, and there was only the sorrow of the end, a finality ripping the future away with remorseless, steady claws. Serena. Where was Serena?

Abandon ship! he forced the words from himself, finding that his voice was loud, loud enough to float across cracking timber and bellowing waves. And they heard. The cry echoed back from different mouths, someone rung the bell as the last chaos settled. Now the world slowed. He moved as though dreaming, with no care either for life or death, and he relaxed his grip, walking the hopeless haze in a trance as the ship bucked, searching for her. All around raged the storm, screaming for attention, all around ran the men, screaming for the lifeboats, screaming for anything, but it passed him by. Strange, silent calm settled around Trebane, and he strolled along the rocking deck, his mind resting upon one single idea – Serena. Within this bizarre mental oasis he scarcely noticed that greatest of all waves until it crashed through him with a deathly, echoing certainty that, for one, endless, freezing second, felt very much like destiny. Perhaps his sense blazed back into existence, for he flinched at the pain, heard the ship break up, felt the force carry him up, up to dizzying heights and then release him to the sea. The bottomless depths closed, so that all was darkness, darkness...

Chapter 1

How much time passed? Empty, meaningless time must have slid silently by as Trebane lay upon the beach beneath a scorching sun, watched over indifferently by the blue sky, free once more of clouds. Just a body, lying prone in the dry sand, its clothes tattered, its hair knotted and matted with salt, alone on the beach, with the bright, fertile green of a jungle growing densely ahead, away from the shore. Now the sea was calm, perhaps having exhausted all its energies in stormy aggression, reflecting the placid blue of the sky as it lapped gently up the shore, caressing his legs with waves that quickly dissolved back into the surface, dissipating through the sand, evaporating away into the heat. The former captain did not stir. His eyes remained tightly closed, welded together with a heavy coating of dried salt, and he made not even the slightest of movements as a solitary crab scuttled past, or when a giant, silver fish leapt from the water in a flash of glittering light. He was a strange, awkward mound of uncomfortable darkness in a scene of extreme, vivid hues, the obvious pain of the figure, flitting as it was between life and death, seemed out of place on the island where the sea sparkled, the sand glowed and the jungle bustled with a thousand colours. Even his silence, for the slow, shallow breaths of sporadic struggle were barely audible against the sounds of vibrant life, of birds squawking their exotic calls, of creaking branches where some wild creature disturbed the undergrowth, and the incessant exhalations of water upon sand, was somehow unfit for this place. All this life, all this beauty of the island only served to frame the miserable mass of the stricken captain, strewn across the sand like driftwood. A small stream of crystal water, which trickled from the leafy green of the jungle, bubbling and eddying around the small rocks in its course, glimmered as a snake across the sand, emphasized the parched lips, the dry skin baked by sunshine, the overall distress of this pitiful man. Still, the island breathed, its ecosystem, its life, apparently unaware of the odd new arrival on its beach, delivered to it by the stormiest of seas.

Hot day gradually faded into balmy night, and the fiery sun retired glowing over the horizon. The sky burned pink and orange, the spreading ripples distorting the watercolour painting upon the sea, while ahead the rainforest came alive with riotous bird song and howling animals, briefly greeting the moonshine before they fell completely silent – replaced instead by the steady clicking and buzzing of insects. Basked in silver, the island became serene. Perhaps stirred by the cooler air or the change in sound, Trebane shifted gently in the sand, his eyes struggling half open but his mind lost, slumbering faraway. With no thought, guided only by some strange instinct, emanating from a deep, subconscious cavern within, he crawled forwards, away from the ocean and towards the wall of foliage forming the entrance to the jungle. Impossibly weak, incapable of standing, held back firmly in a world without thought, he heaved himself through the sand like a dying fish, baked by the day’s sun. Maybe the wild sprawl of dreams and fantasies intruded too far into reality, eclipsing it to plunge the island into a strange magic, for he looked up, intoxicated by the sight of lush, shining greens, spellbound by the insect’s song. There, on the very fringe of the great, tropical trees, half concealed by vines and stooping foliage, stood a bone-white figure, made all the more vivid in the glare of the moonlight, with one arm raised to part the branches, watching him. Strength finally failed, and Trebane buckled, collapsing into the dry sand, his eyes still riveted to the silent, stationary figure that stared blankly back. In this bizarre, hardly conscious world, where dreams and nightmares swirled together as ethereal bodies, merging, mingling, becoming blurry, confused visions of heaven or hell, he saw the bright figure as a skeleton, its limbs of pure white extending as macabre spindles to hold it in animation. Scarcely aware, confronted with a sight so peculiarly unreal that the morning sun would surely erase it from his memory, he was overcome with a foul, nauseous fear, a sense of dread more than capable of overpowering his tottering frame, and he passed out at once. Dark curtains hurried to swamp his mind, rushing across his eyes as they plunged this broken figure into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Morning arrived. A fresh, new sun came peeping over the tree tops until it rose to its podium in the purest of clear skies. With it blazed the heat, beating down upon Trebane’s brittle, broken frame, relentless as he lay in its full view, far from the shade of the jungle. A haze had descended, shimmering over the sea as a glittering mist, dancing, flickering amongst the trees, and he began to wake. Slower this time, for now both mind and body revived themselves as one into miserable, painful life. Gradually, conscious thought struggled back into being, bringing with it aching bones, burning, searing skin, and a thirst so deep, so agonizing, that it wrenched him into life, dragging him forcibly back to the world. This thirst, an awful, all-consuming thirst, towered above all else, drowning out the other pains so that he was able to clamber to his feet despite a series of torturous stabs. Shielding his eyes, gasping, driven by the wild urge to drink, to swim, to do anything to quench the unbearable thirst that tormented him more than anything he could ever have imagined, Trebane looked this way and that, breathing hard, desperate, until his eyes tumbled upon that snaking stream of fresh water. His head spinning cartwheels, hardly able to remain upright, he stumbled towards the life-giving silver before falling, his knees buckling, so that he crawled on all fours like an animal, helpless, fixated upon the stream.

Water revived him fully. Kneeling upon the burning sand, he splashed clumsily into the stream, hurling it from cupped hands into his reddened face, drinking in the life flowing towards the sea. Just how long it took to quench that deathly thirst was beyond him, but gradually, as the sickness of dehydration receded, the pains, the emotions hitherto kept at bay by the primordial drive for survival, jostled to the fore. He slammed down into the stream with both fists, so that the water parted around his body, severing, swerving away into two small waterways, forging separate paths down the beach. There was not one joint within him that did not ache, one bone which did not feel ancient, exhausted, or any muscle that seemed strong enough to lift him free of the gurgling water. Somehow, he had survived, but these minutes of dragging, plodding life were more akin to an intermission, placed accidently between existence and death, for his body felt too battered, too broken, to maintain the moments of living granted by the water. Sunlight dazzled his eyes so that they half closed, the haze played its tricks while he battled to comprehend the new surroundings, so bright, so alien. His mind stuttered through the fragmented memories of that storm, and the wreck. Confusion reigned, collapsing like a tattered canvas so that some light was allowed to pass, enough for half thoughts to form, but not enough to fully distinguish the memories from the present, or the facts from the indistinct, crumbling traumas. Slowly, with the sun beating down in its unrelenting bombardment, he looked around. Striving in vain to stabilize his own thoughts through the mental fog, he gazed about the island, at the beach stretching out on either side before curving away with the coastline, and the tangled jungle with its vivid greens, jostling with bright, tropical flowers.

Over time, his head grew increasingly heavy, the soaring temperatures rising to overcome him, forcing base survival instincts to once more seize control. Beneath that angry stare he was hot, too hot to live, and the trees cast deep, shading shadows. So he moved. After drinking in another long gulp of water, he blundered to his feet, stumbling up the slope of the beach towards that welcoming, beckoning jungle. Some vague impulse resounded within, holding him back. Perhaps he was restrained by the fear of wild animals, or kept away by an unconscious desire to remain near the stream, so he rested at the very edge of the tropical forest. Here, with his back supported by a tall, stout tree, he reclined, gazing down the sand, then out across the boundless, empty ocean. Overheard, huge, sweeping palm leaves, unmoving in the still air, stretched out their shadows to shelter him, and he squinted. For a few seconds, the emptiness of the ocean, the sight of a horizon devoid of even the faintest speck of life, was utterly horrifying. He wrestled with the thought as it writhed away, suddenly filled with a terrible loneliness – a desolation born out of utter isolation, the sorrow that what was had gone, fallen off the world into a place where he could never, ever reach it. So powerless, so weak, to reverse time, to find his happiness, his world, and he wept freely, raging against the prison walls of the sea, sick with the acute agony of loss, loss of everything. Nothing changed, though, there was no care for him from this world, the sun did not flicker, the sea did not stir and the horizon remained totally flat, dead and hopelessly empty. He saw it all, saw how helpless he was against this cruellest of all fates, and despair tormented him until sleep rose up, all powerful and liberating, and he fell into slumber beneath those stooping boughs, stricken, distraught, alone in a world he had never known.

Dawn came as ever, as it always had, always would, bringing with it a new day. This time when Trebane awoke, he awoke as himself, fully aware, his mind alive. Pragmatism returned in part, and he wilfully strove to keep the emotions of the previous day at bay as he made his way down the beach towards the stream, eager once again to quench a gnawing thirst. Yet his will proved weak, he was lost, castaway, and once again the sharp pangs of extreme sadness came cutting. In the trickling water his face stared back, damaged, haggard and bearing all the bitter scars of hardship. He scarcely recognised it, wondered how it could be his own, how he had arrived at this, but there, in his eyes, spun the recollections of the storm, the chaos of that night. Had everyone died? His heart plummeted at the idea of Serena, gone forever, lost with all the others, destroyed with everything else. This sorrow was almost too much to bear, with the grief of her loss only serving to strengthen his desire to be near to her, so that he resented his own survival. All at once, what little drive for life had remained began to leave him, and he felt it ebb away in quiet regret, taking flight like an embarrassed child but no, no. He was here, and, his face flushed as the very thought of it, it energized him, because if he had survived, why could she not have lived, also? Why could countless others not have evaded the depths? If he had been washed up on this island, then some undercurrent must have borne him away, and why would it not sweep others along in a similar fashion? Suddenly, determination flowed through his veins and he rose up, for there was hope. After all, a wave had knocked him overboard, but she had been safer, below deck. Perhaps, even if the tide had not brought her here, she had found a lifeboat, perhaps many had, and drifted upon those giant waves, safe in the light vessel to be retrieved by a passing ship. Or maybe they would drift here. His own survival was proof enough of hope, and hope, regardless of how flimsy it may seem, was reason enough to live on. Still, behind it all, the dark thoughts of doom lingered as grim spectres, eyeing each other with knowing looks, brooding quietly as trolls in a cavern, but he suppressed them, convinced himself that now there must be chance, and he must continue. Despite himself, despite the doubts, he had to search for even the minutest glimmer of hope, for without it, there was nothing.

Now, set upon life, he began to consider his best strategy for survival. All around was so strange, so alien to him after the comfort of the ship, that it was impossible not to feel apprehensive: a fear born out of the unfamiliar. However, he strove for pragmatism, forcing himself to think only on the particulars of the situation, and he found some comfort in such reasoning. Water, above all else, would be vital, and he was, therefore, lucky, or as lucky as he could be, in that it seemed abundant. If he had merely chanced upon a stream, then there would almost certainly be many more scattered about the island, for such a lush, glowing jungle of greenery suggested fertile soils, a clear indication that locating water sources should not prove overly difficult. Secondly, and he felt himself further fortified by the flow of logical thoughts, would be food. To this end, he could see even from his position on the beach how a vast quantity of fruit was growing within the confines of the jungle, but if these tropical, unfamiliar varieties proved toxic, he could hear bird song, see shoals of fish shimmer by in the ocean, and no doubt there were all manner of edible mammals in such an environment, if he were forced to hunt. If all else were to fail, he had already spotted several over-large crabs scuttling sideways along the sand, and felt that these somewhat ungainly beasts would serve as a more than adequate meal. Hunting should be a last resort, though, for the heat of the island was stunning, far more overpowering than it had ever been on the ship, so he determined to preserve his energy. With a matter of fact smile, carved more through his ability to logically deconstruct a crisis than any kind of happiness, he decided that this place was perfectly survivable, containing as it did all the means required to physically live.

Yet unease stole back into his mind, unstoppable, creeping upon him with doubts and fear. This island did not exist. His stomach twisted at the very idea. When the storm had struck, they had been hundreds of miles from any landmass, he had tracked their progress each day and the chart told all – The Stolen Rose had been afloat in the midst of a huge ocean, further from land than it would ever be possible to drift, and with weeks before it even drew close to any. This revelation renewed his examination of the area, and he noted how the pristine, blinding white of sand formed a stark, bright simplicity when set against the rugged, unbridled mess of overgrown jungle. Perhaps he was the first person ever to come here. Loneliness induced terror, and his mind began to race at what could have evolved in a place outside humanity, of what could have kept this place undiscovered in a world tamed by mankind. As he gave his fears the fuel of thought, everything developed an entirely different hue, becoming ominous, dark even in the glow of sunlight. He would have given anything for company, to be back aboard the ship and not marooned here, in a world he was not designed to inhabit. He was lost in a place he did not understand, and suddenly his surroundings became somewhat repellent, as if they despised him for not belonging, hated him for not being part of their world, and he was struck by an urge to run, run as fast possible. Yet there was no hope. The sea enclosed him, time held him in a prison cell built away from the past’s peace.

Think! he said aloud, hearing for the first time how ravaged his voice sounded in the barren air, and flinching at the eerie echo through the stillness. He would wrest himself back to reality, though, regardless of how threatening it was.

He decided that here, on the fringe of the jungle, would be a perfect spot upon which to establish a camp. There was shade, freely given without having to brave the depths of the forest, water, and, crucially, a view of the sea should any ships or survivors drift towards the island.