Theron still had one hand raised to show them the way.
Doreus caught that hand and pulled. It did not yield. The fingers were cold, gritty at the joints, and a small white shell had lodged beneath the thumbnail.
“Theron.”
He put both hands around his brother’s wrist. Behind him, Niko was dragging their boat above the wash, grumbling that the beach was all broken stone. Doreus heard the keel scrape. He heard his own breath. His brother’s mouth stood open around a word that would never come.
The stone was warm on the side the sun had touched.
Something rustled above the beach. Too heavy for a gull: a long, folding sound, followed by a dry movement like rope drawn across rope.
Doreus closed his eyes.
“Niko. Don’t look up.”
“What?”
“Keep your face down.”
His brother’s hand remained in his. He remembered Theron racing ahead to find fresh water, laughing because Doreus had ordered him to stay within shouting distance. He had answered the laugh with an insult. That had been their last exchange.
Now the rustling stopped.
Doreus let go of the stone hand and lowered himself to his knees. He could smell warm rock and the sharp salt left in drying pools. Beneath those smells lay something bitter, like crushed leaves.
A foot disturbed the pebbles in front of him.
“There are two more of you,” a woman said.
Doreus pressed his palms against his eyes. Names from winter stories crowded into his mouth. He swallowed them all.
“We are leaving.”
“The other one is climbing.”
“Niko!”
“I can’t get round the boat. There’s a crack. I’m going over.”
“Stop where you are.”
A stone clicked, then bounced twice. Niko cursed. The third sound was his body striking something below.
Doreus started to lift his face. His fingers tightened over his eyelids before they opened.
“Niko. Speak.”
A gasp came from farther away than it should have.
“Here.”
“Are you hurt?”
“My leg. I’ve got a ledge. Doreus, I can’t—”
“Keep talking.”
The woman moved. Her garment brushed his wrist, and above him came the slow opening of wings.
“Stay,” he said.
The movement stopped.
He had given the word as he would to a man blocking a gangplank. His mouth went dry at the absurdity of it.
“Please. If you move, I won’t know where you are.”
For a while only Niko’s breathing answered. Then the woman said, “I am beside the standing man.”
Theron. She was beside Theron.
Doreus took his hands from his eyes and kept the lids clamped shut. He crawled toward Niko’s voice, sweeping the ground before each knee. A sharp edge sliced his palm. He used the other hand. When he found the rope they had carried ashore, he gathered it against his chest.
One end was still knotted around Theron’s waist.
They had tied it there when the swell broke an oar, so his brother could swim the painter to shore. Doreus had cursed the delay while Theron made the knot twice.
He followed the rope back and worked his fingers under the turn.
“What are you doing?” Niko called.
“Getting the rope.”
“Quickly.”
Doreus pulled against the knot. His brother rocked once on the uneven ground. Stone struck stone with a small, hard knock.
For an instant he imagined levering him down, rolling him to the boat, carrying him home. Their mother would have something to touch. He could put him beside the courtyard wall, where the afternoon sun—
A wave boomed in the cleft. Niko cried out.
Doreus tore at the wet knot with his teeth.
“Can he hear?” he asked.
The woman did not answer.
“Can my brother hear me?”
“I cannot give him back to you.”
His teeth slipped. Salt and blood filled his mouth. He wanted to strike her, to open his eyes and make her look at what she had done. Instead he found the buried end of the knot, pushed it back through, and pulled the rope free.
Theron’s belt buckle scraped his knuckles as it fell slack.
“Tell me where the edge is,” he said.
“Three short steps. Then kneel.”
He took two and crawled the third. His searching hand met empty air. The cleft breathed cold against his face.
“Niko. I’m lowering a loop. Put it beneath your arms.”
“I can’t see it.”
“Feel against the rock.”
The rope rasped downward. Doreus moved it left, then right. Once it struck water. Niko made a desperate little sound.
“Don’t reach down for it. I’ll bring it to you.”
He shortened the rope and swung again. A tug answered.
“I have it.”
“Under both arms. Not your neck.”
Doreus lay flat, heels braced in a groove. He pulled until the rope lifted from the edge. Niko cried out again, but kept moving. A hand slapped the stone beside Doreus’s face.
“Give me your wrist.”
“I’ve got it. Let me see where—”
“No!”
Doreus caught the reaching hand and dragged it toward himself. Niko came over the lip in a scramble of elbows and bare feet, then collapsed against him. He was shivering so hard that the rope trembled between them.
“Close your eyes,” Doreus said into his hair. “Do it now.”
“They are.”
“Keep them closed.”
He tore a strip from the hem of his tunic and tied it across the boy’s eyes. Niko caught his forearm.
“You haven’t tied yours.”
“I know.”
“What’s there?”
Doreus could hear the faint, separate hissings. He had no need to imagine the face above them.
“Hold my belt.”
They crawled toward the sea. Niko could put no weight on one foot. Each time Doreus advanced, he waited for the boy to drag himself after him. Behind them, a wing shifted; he stopped at once.
“I have not followed,” the woman said.
The boat lay where Niko had left it, tilted with its stern wedged between two rocks. Doreus found the gunwale by striking his forehead against it. He helped Niko over the side, felt along the keel, and pushed.
Nothing moved.
The sea had drawn back. He heard the next wave gathering beyond the little beach.
“Niko. When I say, lean toward me.”
He went deeper, water around his thighs, and fitted his shoulder beneath the hull. His injured palm slipped on the wet wood. The wave struck his back and drove him hard against it.
“Now.”
The boat rocked. Stone grated beneath the stern. He pushed again, feeling something give in his shoulder, and suddenly the weight lifted. The keel slid over his arm. Water took the boat.
Niko caught his tunic as he hauled himself aboard.
For a moment Doreus lay across the gunwale, one leg still in the sea. Then he found the remaining oar and thrust its blade against the bottom. Once. Twice. The third stroke found no stone.
“Are we clear?” Niko whispered.
Doreus listened. The little separate voices were gone. Surf still broke close behind them.
“Not yet.”
He sculled until the oar shook in his hands. At last he let it rest and opened his eyes toward the empty sea.
Niko reached for the cloth.
Doreus caught his hand, then loosened the knot himself. When the boy turned toward shore, he laid his palm gently across his eyes.
“Look this way.”
He guided Niko’s face toward the water ahead. Behind his own back, on the narrow beach, his brother was still pointing out the path.
