Free Ruled by Caragh M. O'brien Page B

Peter’s tone. He’d learned enough to know a canoe moved more efficiently with a more experienced canoer in the stern. Peter would handle the subtleties of steering and leave Leon to supply the brute muscle in the bow. It was not a compliment.
    “You paddle like a beauty queen. Lengthen your stroke,” Peter said.
    Leon bit his blade into the black water.
    “More,” Peter said.
    “Why are you even coming?”
    “You think I know? Paddle.”
    Leon reached again, farther, until he felt the difference in the canoe. Smoother. As long as they moved, the mosquitoes didn’t settle along his neck and face, or at least not much. He peered ahead. A mist hovered over the dark water and clung to his arm hairs. Peter steered them effortlessly through the winding waterway, much faster than Leon could have done alone, calling occasionally to switch sides. Despite himself, Leon had to respect Peter’s skill.
    They came around a bend to a longer, open stretch, where chirps and croaks droned over the water.
    “How’s your family?” Leon asked, back over his shoulder.
    “What do you mean? They’re good.”
    “Has your father decided if he’s coming with us or not?”
    “He’s not. My uncles aren’t, either.”
    “Why not?” Leon asked.
    “My dad says this is his home. He says he’s known for a long time he might never have grandchildren. This is where his roots are. He wants to grow old here.”
    “Even if his sons move away?”
    “Maybe he’ll come later,” Peter said. “That’s what I’m hoping.”
    It drove Leon crazy, these people who refused to come on the exodus. Home was more about people than a place. Didn’t they see what it would be like in Sylum once everyone else was gone? They’d be living in a ghost town. But the old matrarc’s husband, Dominic, had gathered two hundred of the most traditional, bull-headed villagers around him, and they could not be persuaded.
    Leon felt bad for Gaia, who kept trying to convince them and kept getting snarled in negotiations about what to take and what to leave behind. She wanted everyone, every single person on the exodus.
    “Mlass Gaia thinks they’ll let us have water when we reach the Enclave. Do you?” Peter asked.
    Leon thought ahead. Outside the walls of the Enclave, they’d find the opposite of what they were experiencing now, surrounded by gurgling water and the rich, loamy scent of the muskeg.
    “I think we’ll have to fight for it,” Leon said.
    “What with?” Peter asked.
    “Our heads,” Leon said.
    “Switch,” Peter said, and Leon lifted his paddle over to stroke on the other side.
    When they reached Bachsdatter’s Island, Leon climbed out of the canoe, and with Peter, wordlessly turned it over on the rocky beach. A pearly, evanescent light muted all colors into gray, and the cliff rose before him, cold and inhospitable. Maybe this was a mistake. He hadn’t been to the island since the previous fall, when they’d gone to fetch baby Maya from the Bachsdatters.
    What a mess he’d been back then, furious with Gaia, hating everything about Sylum. He’d wanted to hurt her and see her as miserably tortured as he’d been. He’d wanted to get to her through Maya since he couldn’t reach her himself, since she didn’t care enough about him directly for his opinions to matter to her. Punishing her for not loving him enough had been his single goal.
    Real smart. But then, he wasn’t smart where Gaia was concerned. Was it that different now, really? He would never hurt her now, but still she didn’t care enough for him. He didn’t know if she ever would. He couldn’t understand this sick thing inside him that made him love her so intensely even when she kept holding back the last sliver of herself.
    “Is there a problem?” Peter asked.
    “No.”
    Leon took to the path, leaving Peter to follow. At the top of the cliff, the homestead huddled, waiting. A few sheep scavenged between scrub and windswept trees, while the clotheslines cut a