Page 46 of Destined Dawn

They swoop closer, sharp fingers scraping at my flesh, angry faces sneering and hissing at me.

I screw my eyes shut.

It isn’t real.

I shove the boat forward, moving it more quickly through the water, trying not to listen, trying not to hear.

17

Stone

The mist is suffocating,pressing on my lungs, sinking into my throat, blindfolding the light from my eyes.

But I can hear. Fuck, can I hear. All the voices from long ago. Friends I lost as a kid on the street. Comrades who died in battles at the front. People who’ve passed from my life. Their voices whirl in the mist, rising and falling like some sick chorus.

And buried among them, a deep voice, a voice that stirs forgotten memories from long ago. A man’s voice. One that sounds just like my own.

My dad’s.

“Pops?” I stutter.

But my own voice is drowned out in the swell of voices. I swing my head around, searching for him. I don’t care if this is a chimera. I don’t care if it’s all an illusion.

I want to see him. I want to see him one last time.

The voices gurgle and I know they’re right there, waiting for me below the surface. I grip the side of the boat, lean right over until my face hits the cold water, and it floods into my nose and my mouth.

It’s my chance. My one chance. To say all the things I’ve always wanted to say to him. To ask him all the questions I’ve always wanted to ask him. To tell him that I’m trying to be a man that would make him proud.

I tip further into the water, the voices welcoming me towards them. And then a large hand claps down onto my shoulder and drags me back into the boat.

Azlan.

18

Rhi

“It isn’t real!”Azlan calls out.

And I know he’s right. We were warned these waters were haunted and Tristan explained what might lurk out here in the mist.

It doesn’t matter.

The voice that calls me is so vivid, so alive, so real. My heart won’t accept it as a fake. It just won’t.

“Aunt,” I whisper back to her as she calls my name through the mist, just like she’d call me back into the house in the evenings. “Are you there?”

She laughs, and I can see her face, her head thrown back, her mouth pulled wide in a smile, her eyes alight.

“Come back,” I urge, “come back to me.”

I was so mad at her, so angry. All of this couldhave been so much easier if only she’d told me the truth, if only she’d explained.

All of those emotions fade now and all that remains is a hungry ache in the pit of my stomach, a longing that hurts so much.

It’s been so hard with her gone. So lonely. So difficult. I miss her every single day. I just want her back. Back with me now.

As if understanding me, she reaches out to me, hands stroking at my skin, many hands, not just hers, stroking, caressing me gently, and then tugging at me, slowly urging me closer and closer towards the water.