Of Mortal Dreams: Chapter V

Althioc

FIVE HUNDRED YEARS AGO

Days like this dispelled any doubts Althioc had as to whether the sea was cursed.

It stretched out before him—furious, roiling, churning around the collection of isles that had become his unlikely home. The gale howled like a wolf at hunt, buffeted against him as if daring him to sway. From his vantage point, the white caps below seemed small but experience assured him that the waves licking the rocks were twice his own height, or taller. Not long ago, the strait had seemed a gift from the gods, a kind of protection that kept his family divided from their enemies. But many years had passed since lesser hands had seized power and forced the Dragars into cold exile. Many summers and winters, all sparse, all harsh, each turn of the season hardening then sharpening his rage into the plan that he now contemplated. For, as he looked across the grey sea from the highest point on Seraq, the largest of the islands that made up the archipelago, he understood what it had bec…