Eehi The Surf Raider: Eehi Meets the Queen

Chapter Four

        I had never been so relieved to see the pointed tips of my home rocks come into view than that day. I was getting depleted of moisture quickly from all the talking I had done and from giving Terh the last of my own. Each Dousan had their own ship, one they had carved and weaved themselves, but they also maintained a home rock.

        It was a safe place we could retreat to if the storms became too violent to weather onboard a vessel. The crystals continuously erode the rocks away, but it takes years for the rocks to show any major signs of it, and decades for whole rocks to crumble into the sea.

         A home rock was especially helpful when a storm destroyed your vessel and you needed somewhere to reside while building another. Our ships were not easily replaced. A shiver ran down my back. I did not want to even think of having to rebuild mine. My father had helped me with this one before he had died.

        I tied the Orahu to my port rock and helped Terh jump to the small cluster of rocks I called home. I located our secret entrance and ushered Terh inside. She stopped several times to admire the intricate working of our rock. It had holes to allow in the sunlight, and passages, and doors. I urged her onward until we came to my family's door. I took a deep breath and entered.

        My mother sat at her usual work bench weaving threads for another crystal cloak. My mother was one of the best weavers in our clan. She worked tirelessly on the sails that hid our ships from enemies. Not that we had many, but you never knew, so it was best to be prepared. She looked up to see who was in her home. She nodded to me and then looked Terh over.

"She is pretty, yes?" My mother signed to me.

        I blushed furiously at this. Yes, I thought she was pretty, but I didn't want her to know that. To answer my mother's question would mean that Terh would know I thought so as well. That would bring me nothing but disaster. Girls were nothing I needed. They were all silly, giddy things whose mind games were tiring. My mother, she wanted me to bond with a female and bring her grand Gelflings to spoil. I nearly shuddered. I did not foresee myself with baby Gelflings.

"She knows how to read our gestures," I indicated to my mother who raised her eyebrows immediately. I braced for it, the anger that was about to explode from her. Dousan were not completely secretive but we seldom brought in outsiders and we never shared our secrets with them. She mouthed an "O" but no sounds came from her.

Then she asked, "You taught her?"

I shook my head and signed, "She taught herself. She is very intelligent."

My mother nodded. I was not sure if it was in understanding or displeasure or really what the movement meant, I only know she did not grow angry. Instead she turned back to her work as if we were not there. Terh smiled brightly at me when I looked up at her. I looked away quickly.

I moved away from my mother and into a small hallway. Terh placed a hand lightly on my shoulder to stop me. I hesitantly looked back at her. I knew the question she was going to ask.

She signed to me, "You did not answer your mother's question."

I frowned. She was finding this amusing. I shrugged and motioned for her to follow. I nearly sighed with relief when I entered my room and found it to be as I had left it. It always plagued my mind to leave. I fear one day I shall return and find my home gone. The desert is a cruel place to live. It's never ending shifts can create beauty or tear it apart at the seams.

My crystal shards still hung peacefully from their strings in my windows. The rainbows danced across my walls just as they always did when the sun was shining. I felt a slight twinge of guilt. Had I not scolded her just this morning for worrying about Thra not being alive for Gelfling futures? And here I was thinking of how I worried about my little room not being here for my return.

I turned to look at her. She was lost in the colors dancing around my room. She softly touched a place on one of my walls where the rainbows appeared. When her hand covered the streaks of colors they did not disappear as she seemed to expect, instead they danced across the back of her palm. She pulled her hand from the wall, keeping it in the path of the colors. She turned to follow the beam, searching for the source.

I pointed out one of my many mobiles of crystal shards, "It is called a prism, the effect that the light causes passing through the shards. That's what you are seeing. The rainbows."

I silently berated myself; I must have sounded like an idiot. I had meant to say that the rainbows were an effect caused when light refracted through the crystal shards. But thankfully, as always, she smiled that understanding, patient grin and continued to pass her hands through the colors in awe. She was pretty, very pretty, more accurately she was breathtakingly...beautiful. It was then that I realized she had me where she wanted me, and I was going to do whatever she asked just to see her smile.

And so I promised to sail her to the capital of the Dousan clan.