Ocean's Breath Plateau avappasugjuk ⏧

Massaraq had not known his sister well and yet he had counted her family all the same. He accepted Ajei's hug and stood near the family that remained on the beach. Death. He thought of those gleaming white skulls, Samani was already cold, her body could not hold warmth long without that mystery of life to send red hot blood through the veins. And yet she looked nothing like that, as if summer were to return for a moment and blow a warm breeze through her fur she might rise again, and yet he knew that the seasons had changed.

He wondered where Galana was. Tears pricked at his eyes, why he did not know. But he felt a deep tug, as if the sea's wind were moving through him as the tides moved the waves in and out. Samani, he rolled the name around in his head and wondered what would remain of her. Death was final, and it felt like an end for all that some might say it was a beginning. He could not stop the bitter tang of loss that hung in the air.