Page 1 of Prima (After the End #8)
The End of the Beginning
The sky is the pink of a conch shell. The sun, already half below the waves, gilds the tips of a seagull’s wings.
A raft skims across the open sea, its mast broken. A young woman kneels at the edge of the raft, her hands stretched toward a young man in the water, but the raft carries her farther and farther away.
“Do you still remember me?” she calls out, her voice cracking.
“For now,” he answers.
There are no tears in his red-rimmed eyes. All the tears have already been shed.
“For how much longer?”
“I don’t know.”
Slowly she rises to her feet, tall and slender. The sea breeze contours her dress against her perfect form and lifts her long black hair.
She brushes away a wayward strand. “I am going to forget you.”
It is not a threat, nor a promise, but a hopeless hope.
“You should,” he says, even as he reaches out his own hand toward her, trying to hold onto this moment, trying to prolong the farewell, trying to prevent the sun from setting and darkness from descending.
But the sun sets and darkness descends. The raft speeds northeast, in the direction of Dragon Gate, beyond which lie the Disputed Waters. The girl becomes a silhouette of flying hair and flying dress in the deepening twilight. And then, an indistinct shape fading into the shadows of the night.
An orca appears at the young man’s side and gently nudges him.
“I know, Old Friend, I know,” he murmurs, tears falling from eyes that should have no tears left. “We have to go. Let’s go.”
But he remains in place until there is nothing left but starlight upon the waves.
Old Friend nudges him again. He holds tight onto her. “Yes, we must go.”
Then he looks northeast again. Maybe he won’t remember the girl, but he will never forget her.
He will know her by the void in his heart. At every sunset he will scan the horizons. Under every starry sky he will study the constellations. And every night, before he succumbs to sleep, he will breathe the rhythm of a name that has drifted beyond recall.