the deep hums with a trepidation that does not seek to be known. it croons sweetly with an archaic tome that begs to be wanted, an apothic lull of simplicity that yearns its deeper roots. beset to the ground. it is sour. it is rot. and from it springs the valour of spent gods and their empty chalice – from whence name and nature are born again. the ground is built on the back of death. on the back of time. the spine rises from the leagues of torment, and charon grins widely in its art. a sepulcher belches its great, sleeping utterance. is it a thing; a what, or a who? frail questions overlap its existence – they are greedy things, hollow things, great insects of myriad trivials that are bound together in their unspoken grief. death preys between them meekly, hungry and praised by their silence. 

disgust still rolls in the titan-bred's stomach.

they are permitted to disappear into their far corners, to which they find meager obstacles to test their mettle, their minds, their mirth. but our thing is of deeper things. far more troubled things. it is owed to us, stolen from us. so we merely pull the strings and teethe along its nerves, biting when it oversteps – but alas! how wrung from our fateful fingers it has spun, and we are useless to its whims. it is no longer boyish. it is no longer innocent. it is no longer an instrument.

it is erasmus. a wolf. a serpent. a rock. a wraith.
what wretched thing we have created. what wretched thing it becomes.

it moves ere beneath the not-moonlight we faced it, despite the warnings of godly intervention and fierce interference. we thought it was carved from the riverbed but it is – it is – it just is – a river, a blackened stygian bed of winding, writhing currents that seethe with wit and sentient violence not unlike the will of a destructive world. it is angry. it is virile and full-breasted with the morals of a slack-jawed jackal, salivating with an aching desire for purpose. we release him unto you. that which was meant to be returned, to be purchased, a stone for a stone. stone no longer. it is shadow and night now, and his veins of gold are simply a gesture of wealth, an omen of what is and what will be. he is wild, wild. and we allow him as such. conqueror.

he is a shadow at her trail, not just at her heels but the farthest tendril shed from her skull – yards apart, separated by breaths and unknowing. all he knows in predatory guile is that she is a part of something he recalls, and it is not isra. it is not eik. it is not raum. and so curiosity becomes him, until he is deeper and deeper into the jungle and it spreads its jaws wide for the ocean at its horizon and the beach that grins its lips at him with a menacing threat. almost enough to remind him. but he is a hunter. he does not care for tempus. he does not care for the relic. not for isra. not for the vulture queen. not for wealth. tonight he hunts nostalgia, and the image of his altars burning with blackened blood alights like a beacon in the dark. white marble halls, silvery, silent. his gold shifts with the night like starlight unfolded into galaxies and he is celestial. 

she does not have a face in the disclosure of his mind. she is not a thing, a creature, a trace of moonlight that slinks into his thoughts like tangible meat. she has no name. he does not recall her at the stead of the island where they had all congregated like birds in a frenzied commune. he did not remember her tearing away from them to traipse into the dark alone, irascible, her contempt a thing to be noted as the pinnacle of her being as if – as if anger had a face itself, wrath contained to mortal twine incorrigible and untameable, unhinged and flung to the wilds. perhaps if he knew he may not have pursued her – perhaps he would have remembered her inconsolable rage, her unkempt madness that roved over miniscule offenses that hardly meant anything but a lapse of momentary thought. even to an irascible thing such as him, a heathen, a heretic, her nature was an ambiguous sort of chaos that spurned him as much as it enticed him.

were not all devils intrigued by fire?

he unravels from the dusky emerald treeline, a wolfish delineation of darkened halves studded in rippling gold, unfurling timbre of iberian musculature – bold curves, sharp angles, smooth lines that slid slick as kerosene. his pace is languid as often, all the while a casual militance that speaks of his warbred physique – calculative steps, a roving machination of rolling muscles that bid and bend to each changing quarter of softened ground and hardened rock. a prepared gait on the casual strife. his thick neck is braided by the shadow of his long mane, its length falling in brine-kissed waves that slick along his spine and drip like oil across his square shoulders. the boyish couture has left him. where all innocence once portrayed some feeble beast in the shadow of courage, now outstepped a young man of machiavellian proportions – something less fearful and more feared, something less childish and more monstrous. what danger pressed to the darkness of his features clung to him with a handsome temptation, kissing taboos that plucked his flesh with perspiration. his beauty is black mamba venom. it is everything that shouldn't be and more. so much more. 

his eyes – how much like crescent moons in the dimlit sky – pass over her, and while they should be spent with the expectation of her rage they are simply lit with a malignant intrigue, something selfish and humorous that touches his lips with the faint trace of mischief. his gaze lolls lazily, arrogantly, watching as she devours the forbidden fruit of the decadent garden with seeming carelessness he could admire. "i wondered if those were poisonous or not," his voice croons over the hum in his mind, something slick and treacherous and deep, peppered with a humor far too dark for the day, "i suppose i will only have to wait to find out, now." the boy in him that should fear her saucy retorts is gone. it is lost instead to impish delight, a fanged sneer that stretches across his features with a welcome as much as a threat.
 

SHE IS THE SPARK OF HELLFIRE EMBERS, SCORN OF WRATHFUL WOMEN ENTOMBED IN A STARE, IN A GLARE – HIS BLOOD DOES NOT FREEZE WHEN SHE LOOKS UPON HIM, BUT THRUMS AGAINST THE SURFACE WITH GRACIOUS REVIVAL. FOR A MOMENT HE BIDS HER WAR, HER FURY – HE AWAITS SPITFIRE ACRIMONY LIKE THE ONSLAUGHT OF VOLCANIC RAIN, A RETORT WHOSE MALIGNITY RIVALED A BADGER'S BREATH. AND WHEN HER EYES SEEK HIM FROM THE DARK OF THE TREELINE, OBSERVED HIS SILHOUETTE REACHING FROM THE EMERALDS IN A CASCADE OF SHADOW AND VEINING GOLD, HIS SPINE PRICKLES LIKE RISING HACKLES ON A WOLF'S NAPE. INDEED HE ENTERS LUPINE AND WILD, A DISHEVELED HANDSOME WORLDS AWAY FROM THE BRINE-SOAKED BOY SHE MAY REMEMBER FROM THE TEMPLE. THERE IS A DIFFERENT HUNGER THAT RESTS IN HIS BELLY, AN ACHE HE FEEDS WITH FERVOR. A DEPRAVITY THAT GROWS IN HIS GUT AND WRITHES ITS WAY THROUGH HIS VEINS, THROUGH HIS THOUGHTS, A WITHERED AND MALIGN VINE THAT CHOKES THE INNOCENCE FROM HIS WARES, HIS AMBITIONS. AN ALMOST DISAPPOINTMENT MENACES THE DEEPENED CONTOURS OF HIS EXPRESSION WHEN HE DISCOVERS THAT HE IS NOT MET WITH THE SAME LOATHING THAT SHE HAD SHARED THAT NIGHT FOR THE FIERY BURD – BUT IT IS FLEETING AND FLIPPANT, REPLACED SWIFTLY WITH A TSKING GRIN. "erasmus."

HE TRAVELS ALONE. HE HAS NO DESIRE TO SHARE HIS WHIMS.

ALAS, AN EAR FLICKS BACK TO THE DEEP OF THE JUNGLE THAT HUMS LIKE WARDRUMS, LISTENING FOR THE HISS OF BURNING LEAVES IN THE FALSE ANTICIPATION OF THEIR FLAME-SLICKED COMPANION. IT IS A GESTURE THAT PRIES AMUSEMENT, KNOWING FULL WELL NONE ARE AT HIS HEELS. THEY ARE SUSPENDED IN SILENCE FOR AS LONG AS IT TAKES TO SATISFY HER (IM)PATIENCE, AND SHE AT LAST ACKNOWLEDGES HIS SCRAPE OF DARK HUMOR. DEATH, SHE JOKES. AS IF DEATH LAUGHS WITH HER, SULLEN AND COLD. ERASMUS DOES NOT. THE GRIN REMAINS REGARDLESS, SOME PITILESS STRETCH OF CIVILITY THAT SEEMS ALL BUT LEFT FOR THE HUSK. IT IS NUANCED ENTERTAINMENT, ALBEIT AN EXPRESSION THAT LACKS ALL WARMTH. THE SHARP GOLD CRESCENTS DANCE IN HIS EYES, MORE LIKE A HAWK, LESS LIKE A FRIEND. HE BEARS NO INKLING OF SYMPATHY FOR HER, EVEN IF SHE HAD BEEN HONEST. 

HER WORDS FIND HIM AGAIN AND HE CONTEMPLATES EACH ONE WITH CAREFUL DEVICE, SUDDENLY WONDERING IF SHE COULD NOT HEAR THE SAME DRONE THAT HE HAD. THE WHISPERS. THE CALL. IT BEGAN WHEN THE GROUND FIRST SHOOK AND THE ASH ROSE SKYWARD – A RINGING, ALMOST, UNTIL IT DIED DOWN TO NOTHING WITH THE SMOKE AND THE SMOG. AND THEN IT GREW. WHAT. HE COULDN'T ANSWER WITH PARTICULARS, HIS MIND CRAWLING OVER HIS INITIAL ARRIVAL TO THE LANDBRIDGE, HIS DISDAIN FOR THE UNCERTAINTY OF WHAT LAY AT THE END BUT THE NEED, THE NEED TO SEE ANYWAY. THE NEED TO FEEL THE BREEZE RUSH OVER HIM IN A WAVE OF ELECTRICITY, OF ICY TREMORS, OF HOT IRRADIATED QUAKES THAT SPOKE TO HIS BONES. THE NOT-MOONLIGHT. THE GOD AT THE SHORE OF A NOT-RIVER. THE STAR-STUDDED GARDEN. IN HIS MIND'S EYE, EACH ONE BLOOMS WITH A PURPOSE, BUT HE CAN'T COME TO UNDERSTAND. WHAT BRINGS HIM. 

HIS EYES WAIVER OVER THE DARKNESS THAT TIPTOES BENEATH THE TREELINE, TOUCHED IN THE DISTANCE BY TERMINUS WAVES. HE STARTED TO DISCOVER THAT THERE WAS VERY LITTLE IN THIS WORLD THAT HE COULD EVEN ATTEMPT TO EXPLAIN. "curiosity." THE WORD TUMBLES OUT OF HIS MOUTH WITH AN UNCANNY LIGHTNESS, TOO MUCH OF A TRUTH TO BE A LIE, THOUGH ITS AMBIGUITY SPEAKS LEAGUES. "seems i'm not the only one. there was a collective, going on about a..." HIS BROWS FURROWED AS HE SCANS THE HORIZON, RECALLING TO THE COMMUNION HE WITNESSED ON THE BEACH. SHE WAS THERE, BUT HE PLAYS COY. "a... some godly trinket, is it?" AN AWRY TICK TWITCHES AT THE CORNER OF HIS LIPS AS HIS EYES SPARK WITH A BLITHE FLAME, DANGEROUSLY PLAYFUL AS HE REGARDS HER FROM HIS PERIPHERAL. HE COULDN'T CARE LESS OF GODS. OF GIFTS. BUT WHEN IN ROME...

Of all things which brought discomfort, which had included the undefeated drone of the hum and the small, beady red red eyes of the strange blackbirds, the sun bore down into his back like a saw. It creased along the dorsal line with an unwavering ferocity – a heavy glare, a grating sheen that sparkled in the scales of perspiration that cried out from his pores. It didn't take long for him to crave all too deeply a return to the damp darkness of the forest with its seabreeze and scattered not-moonlight, despite the jarring display of unnatural-ness that sprouted from the wilderness without much notice. Of course, the proper term for it may have been magic, but Erasmus is a stubborn fool who basks in an old world age, and the simplicity of magic is something that feels too cheap to find a way to his tongue. But it is – and it was – he felt it in his bones, his blood, (we feel it also, we drink it in deeper than any wine sunken to the roots) the way it wove into his flesh and tugged at the springing strings of his hair. It is youth, it is light, it is darkness – how ever darkness, that which curls at his heels and caresses up his thighs, it rolls over his back thinly in some subconscious attempt to veil him from the sun. But it is not his magic that hums. And if it were the word of magic that found his dry belief, he would be certain to know that he was no more a master than a servant to its whims.

Perhaps that could be the greatest discomfort of all.

Almost so great of discomforts of course, that he had nearly lost track of her name when she said it. He had been watching the way the tide rolled in and drove out against itself, all frothing and thundering and hissing against the bright sand. The way it shimmered and grinned in the sunlight, almost as if it were amused with mortality, with its frail bitterness and simple tidings. His gaze waded the waters until the roar of the ocean had just almost drowned the hum that resonated in his ears – before he caught the echo of her name on the wind as a shadow passed overhead, one of the ruby-eyed grackles circling above, shortly joined by another of brighter iridescence. Morrighan. a brow raised as he looked back to her, his skin twitching where the heat of the sun bore down almost unbearably just off the center of his spine. The way she spoke today was – is kinder the word? Was it gentler? Was it more patient? – with a tuned softness that he could not recall from their first meeting, though it still held a tinge of toxicity that lurked in each corner of dialect. He could not tell if he should be concerned or grateful, and so remained on the better side of neutral, attending her every word with a lingering curiosity that probed for meaning.

Erasmus did not care for the Novus gods. It was not a matter of loathing by any means, but a carelessness that grounded itself in his birthright. His every thought of a god was a flawed thing, no thing greater than a mortal but for their immortality and supernatural gifts they were so called by, no matter what name found them. Tempus did not hit a place with him that may have with many others, but he recalled the name thrown around haphazardly by the cavalry at the beachside bridge. In fact, the cadence was lost to some unfound limbo in his wares, to the point that his brows furrowed at the mention and he shook his head slowly. Caligo, Caligo, now that was a name he recalled from the murmurings of passerby and the swift scrolling through pages of history that he wandered through at times of languor, but there was more to it than that. "'fraid not." He answered bluntly, his eyes raising to watch the commune of what was now four circling birds, each silently spectating the two below them with a mighty scrupulous eye. One of them was odd, something deathly and cruel to imagine, were it an exoskeleton who made his crown – a fine knitting of bronze bones caught the glint of the sun when he angled about, or it was the way his feathers were painted bright against his wren-brown down. He was larger than the other three, not quite double their size, and the smooth, coppery undersides of his flight feathers were tinged with a cool green that shifted to blue when he caught the reflection of the sea. The needle beaks of the others remained pursed and thin in their solemn quiet, though in some lights they seem to be almost jagged as a serrated blade.

He shrugged a shoulder and looked back to Morrighan before making steady strides through the sand onward, the small relief of breeze finding the small of his back when he walked. "I take it you're not here for a casual stroll." Erasmus searched for the shadows of landmasses in the distance, but any hint of shade was swallowed by a current stronger than the last. Each crown of frothing white broke over the former with a hungry overbearance, until the moment you would think the sea would devour the whole of the island once more - and they would subside into smaller waves, gentler creases in the ocean tide that washed thinly over the sand in silvery pools. "Or are you here to taste the finer fruits of life? What if this trinket is at the bottom of a volcanic well?" 

HER VOICE ALIGHTS BEHIND HIM BUT IT IS TOO SOFT, TOO MELLOW – IT IS A WHISPER COMPARED TO THE WAVES AS THEY ROAR AND CRASH, DRAGGING AGAINST THE SHORELINE WITH KISSES OF CLAM SHELLS AND IRIDESCENT OYSTER HALVES. THE COLORS TRICKLE ALONG THE LINE, A DELIVERANCE OF PRECIOUS GEMS AND SCATTERED ARTS THAT ARE TAKEN HUMBLY WHEN NOT RECEIVED. THEY ARE NOT FOR HIM. SO HE DOES NOT MOVE TO GREET THE WAVES AS THEY FROTH IN, GLITTERING AND INFALLIBLE IN THEIR CHARM – AND HE THINKS, WOULD THE BOTTOM OF THE OCEAN BE ANY BETTER THAN THE HEART OF A VOLCANO? THE POOR LOT OF THEM INDEED, TO CHASE A TRINKET THAT NO ONE TRULY UNDERSTANDS, INTO THE DEPTHS OF CHAOS. BUT WHAT HE SAW IN THE DEEP OF THE FOREST, WHERE THE NOT-MOONLIGHT HAD BEEN BADE AWAY, AND THE DARKNESS SEEPED THROUGH THE CRACKS IN A CARICATURE OF SECRETS... THE OCEAN ROARED ON ONE END, HARDLY COMPLACENT. WAS IT THE SEA, THEN? WAS IT ALWAYS THE SEA, TRULY?

HE HEARS HER AGAIN, LIGHTER NOW, A JEER THAT DISTURBS HIM FROM HIS TRANCE. THE BIRDS PASS OVER ONE, TWO, THREE, THEIR SHADOWS LOOMING HIGH ABOVE THEM LIKE SPECTRAL VULTURES, AND THE ILLUSION IS ONE HARD TO BREAK. THE SEA, UNENDING, UNCOMPROMISING, ITS HORIZON MELDS INTO THE SKYLINE TOO MUCH SO THAT IT IS UNCERTAIN WHERE ONE ENDS AND THE OTHER BEGINS. IT IS FINALITY, A TERROR SCAPE IN ALL NONCHALANCE OF BEAUTY. IS IT TOO OUTLANDISH TO ASSUME THAT THERE ARE, TRULY, THINGS THAT LURK BENEATH ITS SURFACE WORTH EVERY OUNCE OF ITS HORROR? WERE THERE NOT THOSE WHO STARED OUT INTO THE INTERMINABLE REACHES OF THAT DECADENT SEA AND MADE THEMSELVES TOO MAD TO THINK ANY LESS OF ITS POTENTIAL? WOULD IT BE A RELIC THAT ROSE FROM ITS WAVES, GLEAMING AND GLORIOUS IN ALL ITS CELESTIAL RIND, A SHEEN TOO FINE FOR THE EYES OF MORTALS? OR WOULD IT BE WHAT CREEPS ALONG THE UNDERTOW, HUNGRY AND FERAL, THAT WHICH LEAVES ITS GIFTS AT THE SHORE FOR THOSE SO GREEDILY ENTHUSED THAT THEY MAY BE ENSNARED IN THE RISING CURRENT? 

ERASMUS BROKE HIS FIXATION ALMOST TOO PAINFULLY, BUT A GRIN PINNED THE CORNER OF HIS LIPS INTO SOMETHING THAT MIRRORED HER WRY DISTORTIONS WITH AN AMIABLE AGREEANCE. THE SYMMETRY OF HIS FACE IS MARKED WITH DELECTABLE SHADE – CONTOURS THAT GREEDILY FEAST ON THE WAY HIS EXPRESSIONS SEETHE WITH CONSTANT FERALTY, FIENDISH AND ALMOST TOO CRUEL. IF THE SHARPENED ANGLES OF HIS APPEARANCE WERE NOT ROUNDED BY AN ETHEREAL, DARK SENSE OF GRECIAN BEAUTY, HE MAY RESEMBLE A MONSTER YET. "do they exist, then?" HE TOYS, THE WORDS CURLING AROUND HIS TEETH SLY AND SMOOTH, HIS EYES NARROWED TO SLITS THAT ARE PRECISE WITH THE KEEN CLEAVE OF GOLDEN CRESCENTS. BUT IN THE DEPTHS OF THEIR ECHOLESS BLACK, THERE DREAMS THE SILENT DREAMS OF BEADY EYED SLUDGE FIENDS FROM THE SALTY LEAGUES, GILLS AND TEETH AND ALL. THEIR IMAGE IS AN ART UNDONE, AND HE COULD NOT FEAR THE IDEA AS MUCH AS IMPLORE THEIR DEVICE. MONSTERS, WHAT THEY MAY BE IN MORTAL FLESH, DID NOT SEEM AS PERILOUS A STRAIN OF VIOLENCE AS THE AMBIGUITY OF THE SEA ITSELF.

IN HONESTY, IF HE NEVER GAZED UPON THE SEA AGAIN IT MAY BE A GRATEFUL CURSE.

BUT HERE HE IS NOW, STARING BACK AT IT WITH A BEGRUDGING TRANCE THAT EXPELS FEAR FOR A LEVEL OF RESPECT GARNERED BY INDOMITABLE FORCES OF NATURE AS SUCH, AND HE CANNOT HELP BUT THINK TO THAT PLACE IN THE FOREST AT THE BASE OF THE VOLCANO. THERE WAS A CERTAINTY IN THE REALM OF UNCERTAINTY WHEN ALL THINGS WERE AND WEREN'T IN A PLACE OF CONSEQUENCE – AS IF TIME NOT ONLY STOOD STILL BUT BACKTRACKED THE BEADY KNOLLS OF ANT MOUNDS AND CLEFT ROOTS WHERE THE MAGIC OF DECAY CURDLED AND CULTURED. HE THOUGHT OF SINCERITY IN A GALAXY'S VOICE, IN A CURSE, IN A CALLING. AND IN THE RECOLLECTION, HIS MOUTH PARCHED ITSELF WITH THE MEMORY AND THE TASTE OF SALT. "i saw something earlier, i was just thinking on it." HIS VOICE SWELLS WITH AN INDIFFERENT DISTANCE AS HE PLACES HIMSELF BY MIND IN ANOTHER PLACE, ANOTHER TIME, THERE AT THE DRIED BED OF A NEVER-CREEK AND THE SOFT GLOW OF NOT-MOONLIGHT. "a someone lesser or greater than a mad creature, but i was told it was always the sea." HE PAUSES FOR A MOMENT AND LOOKS BACK TO MORRIGHAN, TASTING THE AIR FOR CONTEMPLATION LIKE A FORK TONGUED GRASP ON THE ECCENTRICITIES OF MUSING. NOVUS, WHETHER IT WAS HELL OR AN ACHING DREAM OF RESTLESS ETERNITY, SEEMED ENDLESS WITH ITS PECULIAR ENGAGEMENTS, AND AT ALL TIMES HE COULDN'T BE ENTIRELY SURE THAT EACH EXPERIENCE WAS NOT WITHOUT ITS LABOR OF MADNESS. WHAT MORE HE SAW DURING THAT LIAISON WITH THE HERALD OF RUINATION HE KEPT TO HIMSELF. "could you imagine drowning for the sake of a trinket? let someone else find it, then." 

WITH THAT HE TURNED HIS BACK TO THE SEA AND RESUMED HIS WALK FOR THE DEPTHS OF THE FORESTS THAT HUMMED WITH A STATIC GRIEF. THE FARTHER HE WALKED FROM THE SHORE, THE SLOWER THE CIRCLING BIRDS PASSED, ONE BREAKING RANKS TO RETREAT FOR THE DARKNESS OF THE TREELINE. HE DIDN'T BLAME IT, AND MOVED FOR THE SAME DIRECTION. "i prefer the shade, anyway." 

She warns of a thousand tentacles and a faulty slip into the vast, treacherous sea – but he does not shiver, all but grin to her remarks with the thought of great, tentacled, toothy things that rest in the trenches. It is only when he remembers being dragged into the depths of a stormy sea that his grin slowly vanishes, but not into a fearful expression but a soft scowl that seems more plainly placed than its former glee. To think it was tentacles, and not seaweed, that had wrapped his ankles as he swam furiously against the current that dragged him down, down. Into that murky blue below that swam with indiscernible shadows and the lore of a many seawrecked sailors. There was much of the sea to be known – he was raised too far from it, in a place that dreaded tales of dragons in the mountains much more than the serpents of the seas – to perceive its depths and what rested in it. Too naive to truly fear the old ones that bathed in briny darkness.

Perhaps if he had been told tales of the sea instead of tales of the toothy, jagged mountains that bore their fire-breathing fiends from the depths of fathomless caves, he might have feared it even more. Perhaps, like having been told those tales of smoking mountains, he would have feared it less. Regardless it was there, always there, far beyond the treeline as it always had been, waiting for him.

He caught himself staring back at the ocean when she spoke again and made to follow him – and he took care not to let his mind linger too long at it, not to search too deeply for tentacles or fins or the trace of not-moonlight summoned from the veining waves. He realized in pondering that it was not what existed in those bottomless depths, those cursed leagues that stretched on and on into innumerable darknesses, those unending nights of reef dreams and coral nightmares, that unsettled him at his core. It was the ocean itself – the might of it. The length of it, stretching on as far as the eye can see and beyond even that – into places he would never know, and the depth below even that. The sheer unknowables of it. It was not a fear that was born from these wonders, but a deep seated respect that gathered that fear, that the sea looked to him not as a home.

The sea looked to him as an open coffin looks to the reckless.

Somewhere between them her voice comes to him over the waves like a gurgle of seawater and the cry of gulls and he realizes he has been looking to the ocean again. He looked back to her momentarily, searching her eyes for the mischief that lingered as she joined him in his journey into the woods. There is no reflection of the ocean in there, and for that he is somewhat placated and will never understand why. There is only fire there, burning bright and wild, temperate and unbidden, and despite knowing her spite was a fuse short of a hair's breadth, he thinks her temper is not quite so terrible as the unconquerable currents of the ocean. Without another word, he allows her to bridge the gap of silence as she pleases, and in turning against the sea, seeks again the depths of the woods.

finite.