Ocean's Breath Plateau Using your words just to move up a base

It felt wrong to travel anywhere without Chakliux. The man was always there when Raiyuk went on his outings from the lodge, or ventured to the other ulax to visit his friends; but neither his father nor any of the other children were here. It was only himself and Nasamik. That was fine for a while — but as the journey between villages stretched on, he lagged back a bit, and it took constant prompting by his mother to keep going. The boy looked over his shoulder often for his father, and was a sour-faced, despondent brat by the time the pair reached Moontide's limits.

The reminder from Nasamik to mind his manners was met with a soft raspberry blown her way, and a pout, as he scowled at the rocky ground. It smelled bad here; his nose wrinkled when he caught the salt in the air, and then he kicked one of the loose rocks across a small henge of the plateau, listening to it skip along until it hit a patch of grass.

He pulled away from his mother at the last moment, and refused to speak.