Chapter Fifteen
While you might admire the sea glass pendants common amongst the locals, it is a terrible insult to ask to purchase one. They believe this unique aqua glass to be goddess-touched. Children scour the beaches in hopes of finding a piece, and when one appears it becomes a cherished family heirloom.
Akeisa: Customs and Culture
by Guildmaster Klement
The island was thawing.
Every day dawned a little brighter, a little warmer. The differences were slight, almost imperceptible. But Aleksi was the god of all things that grew; part of his power was tied to the land, to the ebb and flow of the seasons, and to the changes that those passing days brought.
He could feel those changes, within him and without. So, when Naia asked him and Einar to join her on an adventure, a mischievous smile playing on her lips, Aleksi left his coat behind and rolled up his shirtsleeves before they left the shadowed confines of Gwynira’s palace of melting ice.
Naia, likewise, wore no cloak today, and her light, almost gauzy dress rippled in the gentle breeze as she led them away from the palace and down a slightly overgrown path.
The trees bent overhead, bare branches stark against the clear blue sky.
Here and there, Aleksi could just glimpse little flashes of green—tiny buds emerging on the frozen limbs.
Not so dead, after all.
Curiosity overtook Aleksi, and he grabbed Naia’s hand. “Where are you taking us?”
She glanced back at him over her shoulder, the mischievous smile now coy and inviting. “To my favorite beach.”
“I see. And it was your favorite because . . . ?”
Her cheeks turned pink as her gaze flitted to Einar, and Aleksi hummed his understanding. This had been a place special to her because of its association with the storm god, and she hoped that seeing it would spark some hidden memories for Einar.
Dread tinged the pleasure of the moment for Aleksi. Naia had been so happy since that quiet moment in the restored temple, as if simply being there with him and Einar had lifted some terrible burden from her shoulders. Joy radiated from her, and Aleksi did not wish to see it dimmed.
Especially by something that Einar could not help.
“Actually, come to think of it, I’m not sure if the beach is even still there.” That seemed to give her pause. “Though it doesn’t feel it to me, it has been thousands of years.”
“The tides change the shorelines,” Einar agreed. “And sometimes they change it back. I’ve seen the same beach vanish and reappear a hundred times over the years.”
Aleksi slid his arm around Naia’s waist and drew her close. “I have a good feeling about this one,” he murmured against her temple.
She looked up at him. “Do you really?”
“I do. Your island would never let your favorite place be lost to you.” He kissed her softly. “You’ll see.”
Naia stopped and hauled him back down for a longer, sweeter kiss, one she finally broke with an apologetic sigh.
She was still self-conscious about what had happened the night of the ball, when her emotions and sensations had spilled over, and she had been carefully avoiding intense physical contact ever since.
But all she said was “Come on,” and pulled them farther down the path.
They broke out of the trees and brush at the rocky edge of the beach, and the sight of it stopped Aleksi dead in his tracks.
People milled about, chattering excitedly, but that wasn’t what held Aleksi’s attention. The shoreline was strewn with hundreds—thousands—of bits of glass. Sea glass, Einar had called it, little water-polished pieces that were all varying shades of teal, just like the one in the necklace Naia wore.
She clutched at the pendant now, her eyes welling with tears. Einar crouched, wordlessly gathered a handful of the glass, and stared at it in wonder.
One by one, the islanders began to notice their presence. A few of them approached, then more, with bits of sea glass clutched in their hands and spilling from their pockets.
“My lady. Please.” One woman carried dozens piled in her outstretched apron. “A blessing?”
“Of course.” Naia’s voice was thick with tears, but she ran her hand over the glass, sifting it through her fingers as she murmured soft words of benediction.
Others followed suit, their voices overlapping as they begged for Naia’s favor. She complied, even as tears slipped down her cheeks.
Before long, the throng of people threatened to overwhelm her, and Einar intervened, placing a protective hand on the small of Naia’s back.
“It would mean a great deal if we could have this place to ourselves for a little while.” His voice was kind but unyielding.
“It has been many, many years since the goddess was able to walk her favorite beach.”
Not even the lure of having the goddess bless their treasures could make these people defy their prince. They subsided with murmured thanks and apologies, drifting away to disappear over the dunes.
When they had gone, Aleksi bent and retrieved a piece of the glass. He rubbed his thumb over the smooth, rounded surface, then pressed it into Naia’s hand.
“This obviously means very much to them, and also to you.” For once, he could not decipher whether the source of her tears was happiness or agony. “What is this glass, Naia?”
“It’s garbage,” she replied with a sobbing laugh.
“It’s what?” Einar asked, stunned.
Naia clutched the piece of glass to her heart.
“Theron and I were walking here one day, and I found a piece of sea glass. I was so excited, because it was my very favorite color. And he was just confused. Said they were only pieces of broken bottles, washed smooth by sand and water. And that there were millions of them scattered all across the ocean floor.”
When Einar shared stories about Rahvekya’s past, they were just that: stories. His tales had a certain distant quality about them, a sense of recitation, as if he had learned every detail by hearing it hundreds of times.
Naia’s story was more immediate. Closer. Her words were more about emotions than events, and relating them to Aleksi and Einar made her tremble even as she smiled. She had lived these moments. She had been there.
This was her life.
Naia laughed again. “I told him that I didn’t care if the glass was just refuse. It was beautiful to me.” The laughter faded as she gazed out across the rocky sand. “The next day, my beach looked just like this. He never understood why I liked it. But he wanted me to be happy.”
Though tears still coursed down her cheeks, Naia beamed at the memory. She shone so brightly that it almost hurt to look at her, so Aleksi did not take his gaze from her face. Did not even blink.
He wanted to bear witness to this love.
Einar rubbed his thumb over a piece of glass. “Jinevra has kept hers since the day she and Petya left the island. It’s sacred to her.” He smiled tentatively. “This story would probably make her love it even more.”
“It should,” Aleksi told him. “Because that’s what love is. Giving someone what they need, even if we don’t understand it.”
Einar’s smile gave way to a yearning so sharp it felt like biting on metal.
Jealousy swelled in the space between the three of them, because Einar wanted so desperately to be the one to give this sort of gift to Naia, and he did not yet understand that he had, in his former life and in every day of this one.
That secret was not Aleksi’s to share. Still, truth found its way to his tongue. “Theron sounds very special.”
“Yes,” Naia whispered. “He is.”
A strange shimmer cut through the slanting sunlight off to their right. Aleksi turned his head just in time to see the shimmer solidify into two figures—a slight, unassuming woman with reddish-brown hair, and a huge, glowering hulk of a man.
The woman met Aleksi’s gaze, tilted her head, and vanished in another strange ripple of nothing. She was there one moment and gone the next, as if she had simply winked out of existence.
Or stepped into the Dream.
The man remained, and a wave of pure rage nearly knocked Aleksi over. Most people with ill intentions tried to hide them; this man seethed with his, anger and violence lashing from him in dark, whipping tendrils.
The last locus of villainous magic they had encountered—the woman who had kidnapped them—had been dark but scrupulously self-controlled.
This man was chaos and death made flesh.
Then he roared and flung out his hands. The skin of his palms split, and wicked shards of metal erupted from him. The projectiles spun as they whistled through the air, some unholy cross between spikes and spearheads.
“Naia!” Einar tackled her, and the spikes barely missed the two of them as he bore her to the rocky ground. She screamed, not in fear or pain but in protest and righteous, indignant fury.
The sound of their goddess in distress began to draw people back down the beach. If they crossed the dunes once more, the carnage would be unthinkable. Incalculable.
No. Aleksi ran toward them, waving his arms. “Stay back! Don’t come any—”
A shouted warning supplanted his, and a spike shot past Aleksi’s head, so close that he felt its wake like a glancing blow. He looked back to find the hulking man closing the distance between them, bearing down on him with heavy, lumbering strides.
“My lord!” One of the villagers had braved the dunes to toss a staff to Aleksi.
He caught it and spun just in time to knock another projectile off its course. The staff had been exquisitely carved, expertly weighted, and Aleksi realized that this was more than craftsmanship. It was ingenuity driven by necessity.
Colonized people were rarely allowed to keep weapons. So they turned their tools to that purpose instead.
Naia and Einar had both climbed to their feet, and she gestured toward the villagers who had returned. “Get them back!”