Stavanger Bay and every minute gets longer

I will survive. Perhaps. I hate my internet not wanting to work most of the time though ugh.

Suspicion mounted quite the attack; Mordecai embraced the notion that he was in front of one of Verrine's children with little wavering. The beats of silence that followed his statement and the not-so-inward struggle of surprise and growing resentment told him much of what he needed to know. Something had happened here, but just what he could not have guessed. He would not have guessed it either when the speckled youth dropped a metaphoric bombshell onto him. It broadsided him to consider, think, and even hear such words. Dead? Impossible.

Yet that spark of recognition was smothered as the youth bitterly demanded more of Mordecai. He wasn't hardly allowed the moment to process what he was being told, let alone consider the plausible truth. Mordecai let out the breath he had been unknowingly holding; he wasn't entirely sure how to handle this other than to relent and reply. "I didn't visit because of the winter," he answered, almost wanting to state that he had his own worries to handle. But those had gone out the window relatively easily when he had left the Spine. He left that answer open ended. "But my name is Mordecai, and I'm from the Plateau." And finally his relenting stopped, leaving him to return a question.

"Who are you to ask and tell me such things?"