His dreams were not the ones he desired, but nor did he want them to end. Being back home among his family was a much better story than waking up in the middle of the ocean bereft of their presence, but seeing their faces only reminded him how scary little he knew of their well-being—how they fared. Wanting to forget a loved one you're cut off from isn't heartlessness; it's practicality—when the grief is so overwhelming that you can't tolerate a trickle of reminisce without the whole dam bursting. Forgetting, ignoring, pretending: these are the numbing agents the mourner salves his heart with when waking out of a phantom reunion. Neteyam and Kiri, Spider and Neytiri—they faded back into shadows as Jake slapped the tiredness out of his face.

They were shy of morning by another ten degrees, so the night sky was shifting fast as it prepared for the sun's arrival. The ocean was mystifying in the early dawn when neither blazing star nor blinding moons reigned, but all was lit by the world's halo. Sparkling jewels flitted around the leviathan then disappeared on day's approach: the fish had retreated to the shadows of the underbelly, benefiting from their benevolent guardian like the ones above surface. It was very quiet. Jake looked over his shoulder for Tsireya, fearing she again played the vanishing act, but she was present and doing something unusual: standing in the middle of the wet stage with her back to him and wrapped up in zen. She raised her foot as rhythmically as a wave, then set it down in gentle crash—ebbing, lifting, then rolling again. Arms and tail swayed like the breeze as she seemed to draw into herself the very breath of the world. She was an enchanting enigma doing something new that the retired vet could not deduce the reason for. When she discovered he was awake, she ceased cordially.

"Kamenah."

She walked over, her wet feet slapping against the rind of their shallow island as she was doused in all the vibrant hues of the rising sun, half her body yellow and the other, deep green. She squatted on the ball of her heel before Jake to allow herself to see into him unhindered, but her empathetic eyes were unappreciated by Sully, who only saw "examination" from a doctor he didn't want her playing.

Unexpectedly, she pointed dead ahead, over the waves their chauffeur was breaking through.

Land?

The weary castaway stood to his highest vantage, checking with anxious hope and straining his eyes to catch anything he could on that empty, quivering horizon, but sighted nothing; Tsireya, however, did—the moment he unthinkingly set his back to her. Her subtle gasp froze him on the spot, which made him shut his eyes in defeat. She was still cupping her mouth when he brought his chest around and admitted to his shame with a bowed head.

Was kinda hoping you wouldn't notice…

Her palms moved up and covered her scalp in astonishment that he was even still alive after such an injury. Already, she was stepping towards him.

"No. No." He waved. "Please, do not help me."

At this point, Tsireya was so fed up with his ongoing obstinance that she smacked a balled fist into her other palm to silence his protests. She then announced their word for "death" to make him understand just how serious his condition was, her eyes fearfully earnest on his behalf. He still wasn't sure, so Tsireya dropped the toughness and gently reached over to palm his shoulder; her fingers could hardly encompass the width, but she held her grip with a soft authority.

|"Plessuh mano ma, Avatarh. Soish ah vekxi danahee. Plessuh… Ples."|

You really want to help? His head bobbed. Okay, kid, you win. So the warrior kneeled before her, baring his neck to her sight. What Tsireya discovered was an unholy mess of black, flaking skin and scrawny wisps of remaining braid held together only by the dried blood from where the link was severed; she did not dare touch the injury lest she provoke the gangrene. The sea maiden bit her knuckle, lost in thoughts Jake wished he could hear. She ordered him to stay where he was, and was very stern about it too, before she flew for the helm and made another series of pats on the leviathan's crown, repeating the sequence till their ride stopped, then Tsireya, without warning, dove into the sea.

More food?

Curious, Jake leaned over the edge to eye her movements since directly following her would land him in trouble again. Underwater, she swam gracefully towards the eye of their ship's captain and hovered there, balancing her buoyant self, where she then proceeded to, of all things, sign to the animal—it was unmistakable this time.

She is talking to the whale!

Swiftly as she dove, Tsireya breached quietly onto the whale's back and eyed Jake from under a narrow brow when she caught him too close to the ledge; the man on probation moved back inland.

The tail raised mightily, and after it slapped the water, the breeze started to pick up. Without sails, they were at full speed with no sign of stopping.

A foot planted on a leathery ridge, a hand set to the crown for balance—Tsireya's hair flew wildly to the currents as she kept a weather eye on the horizon and only breaking that concentration to heed the other passenger. She winced, seeing him reduced to the tail end of their vessel, doubled over from seasickness; perhaps interfering with the speed wasn't the most delicate decision. So it came as a relief to her when she finally spotted something on the horizon.

"Avatarh! Avatarh, oea min ha!"

When the last of the swirling spray hit Jake's face, and the ride began to slow, did he, groggy as he was, react to Tsireya's animation. Pulling back on his hands, he managed to hike his body up and see, past the rump of the creature's head, a great blur in the distance.

Oh… Finally…

Land.

It was protected by black sentries—statuesque mountains, rugged and mighty in form, eclipsing Polyphemus in challenge of his handsomeness. In the centre of this land, which was an island, was its birthing volcano that gave life to a forest—a jungle so lush that the sweet perfume of fresh water could be detected miles offshore. A colossal mangrove circuited the paradise, appearing as if they held it up on their rippling backs while the becalmed ocean flowed under their spanning legs and disappeared in verdant caves.

Jake propped himself up onto his knees and watched dumbly as the island came larger into view.

"Tùlumahay," she said to him, pointing to the shores.

Too-loo-mah-hi… He was assuming the place to be her home, so the reserve in her eyes and the solemn turn away made no sense to Jake; from his perspective, she had more reason to be elated than he. A splash then alerted him, then another, and yet another. He looked about and saw a rainbow of colours leaping from the water. It was a pod of sea beasts similar to a plesiosaur that had come to pay a salute to their marine brother. The frolickers corkscrewed through the air, some up to three times, as each tried to outdo their pod mates. Watching them brought back a smile on Tsireya, who responded to their clicks with joyous yips of her own. She dove into the water and reemerged, now riding one, before speeding to the front of the procession.

As the aquatic fanfare paraded closer, more topography became clear to Jake, noticeably the salient breakwater walls that tamed the attacking ocean into a calm. Upon passing through the opening to the harbour, Jake peered and saw that existing on the opposite side of these barriers were manifolds of shallow pools created by the clasping arms of that bending rock. The forces of nature, thrashing just on the other side, came down as gentle rain to refuel the bucolic beds where farmers were at work collecting food. When the tidal pool gatherers spotted the extraordinary aquacade, they dropped what they were doing, some quite literally, as baskets splashed and bobbed in the water while their makers skipped down the terrace of narrow rims to follow the convoy.

Having lived so many years as a chieftain who wore regalia, it was hard for Jake to ignore the awkward feeling of arriving in an unkempt state, especially under the onslaught of so many stares. He was entering the heart of a powerful clan with no show of respect to his habiliment. He might as well have been arriving in flip-flops and dreads, thought Toruk Makto with shame.

The sea escorts broke away, except for Tsireya's mount; she remained in the water, having bounded up to Jake's position, and signalled for him to step onto a pontoon raft she had retrieved. It was made up of four logs secured tightly together, but that didn't alleviate Sully's hesitation after journeying down the fin to do as she instructed. He hovered his foot, but the second it made contact, he slipped. Luckily, Tsireya's arm was out, already in anticipation of a fall, and steadied the man until he formed a comfortable stance: a crouch that spoke a readiness to take action, as passivity was not a trait he'd display that day.

Tsireya grabbed a tether from Jake's pontoon and swam her mount towards the shore with him in tow. Once again, he was victim to stares, this time in closer proximity, as the curious onlookers from before came riding in on plesiosaur-esque creatures of their own.

They, at last, reached the first crop of white shore jutting far out from the main beach; the gathered crowd simultaneously dove, and it was back to being just him and Tsireya. Far away, he saw them appear again, collectively wading onto the sand to then skip off and spread the news. Tsireya, his chaperone, disembarked from her mount to pull his raft ashore, and Jake was more than happy to be back on solid ground. Checking over his shoulder, he caught his whale friend already veering for the open sea. Jake was sorry to see him go so soon but acknowledged he'd kept the animal long enough.

"Oea mawi hìkrr tìyushchaw," Tsireya spoked hurriedly at him.

Her use of two digraphs made him blink, but his brief surprise on hearing a Na'vi use "ch" and "sh" was overtaken by his more pressing concern of Tsireya trying to leave him. He reluctantly watched her dash off, understanding she was probably going on ahead to inform her leaders of his arrival; still, he hated being stranded out in the open with nothing better to do other than twiddle sand between his toes, knowing that at any moment he'd be swarmed by a crowd of teal blue.

Aaaand here they come…

The nameless people were filled with vitality, each proclaiming their racial pride in how fast they could run or how loud they could yell; yes, he saw violent battles and horrors beyond name, but to watch a tsunami of rippling sinew racing towards you at full speed was just not something the Marine would ever get used to.

The horde opened up to engulf him, swift as the wave, cutting off any chance to escape, and after they slowed and Jake saw them at full height, he wondered why he felt intimidated in the first place.

Oh, you guys are short.

True enough, few of the people cracked beyond 8'5", making the 9'7" man a head taller at the very least. Dimorphism did not discriminate in this part of the world, as the men shared near equal height with their women. But this comradery between the sexes was best observed in their most striking cultural trait: black tattoos. Decorated on every adult—adolescents did not partake—were sharp, intrinsic designs unique to the wearer, for no two were alike; but certain patterns could be observed, telling Sully there was a principle to how this art was practiced, unlike the meaningless tribal tattoo he once purchased during his time in the Corps as a way to fit in. His squad loved it, though. The jokes never stopped coming.

On theme of being scrutinized for his choice of style, these warriors prodded his person, narrowing in on everything different about him. A hushed gasp then arose behind his ear, alerting Jake they had noticed his broken queue; the crowd pulled back in horror; a natural reaction, he reasoned, that is, until Sully's oscillating ceased upon the actual cause: to open up for the arrival of new inspectors—the clan leaders, helmed by Tsireya. She cast Jake a look that told him to bow his head in respect, but he didn't need the reminder; his head bowed in spite of himself at the pair's tangible sovereignty.

The olo'eyktan was of powerful physique, his face the most decorated, and his build the tallest—that is, until Jake arrived. The man stole attention just by existing. For raiment, he wore epaulets of purple and tangerine feathers accentuated by braided orange cords raining down his muscular arms and leather chest rig that folded like fish scales. Around his neck was a collar of iridescent teeth so jagged and large Jake thought they probably belonged to the deadliest sea monster—something this man didn't look incapable of challenging.

Now, the woman abreast him was just as foreboding; a single alabaster shell rested upon her forehead attached to a band that seemed to merge with her hair—the tsahìk of this clan, for hanging under her chin was her swoka pxitx (sacred needle) sheathed in a slender pearlescent conch. Maybe the less ostentatious of the pair, but she was the one Jake was more fixated on, particularly her familiar face. A quick scan at Tsireya to confirm his suspicion, and he straightened out his already vertical spine in preparation of a mother's incoming inspection.

Stern blue eyes bordering on turquoise pierced his soul in her transcendental search for tìkawng (evil). To Jake's misfortune, she found it—in his hand, where it had grown into a fifth finger. With a shocked outcry, she clenched his wrist and held up the hand for her equally stunned mate to behold, proclaiming one word for all to hear: "Avatarh!"

The crowd was alarmed by this reveal and shouted their agitations, but Tsireya swooped in to disarm the situation. |"He a nah tulkoon adia he!"| However, she was met with such a gaze from the tsahìk that the girl shrank back, head low in submission, and turned to her olo'eyktan, whom she then addressed in a chastened, politer tone. What she said to him, Jake couldn't interpret and, therefore, couldn't add to the testimony she offered in his defence—if it was in his defence. Since this wasn't the first time he found himself in this scenario, Jake knew it was much safer to stay put with a dumb look on your face than to risk speaking up and offending a species so naturally adept with knives. He paid careful attention to the reactions of the olo'eyktan while Tsireya was speaking to him, and when her address completed, the leader gave Sully an enigmatic stare. Finally, the man came over.

|"Muah na dekanar sasi un an dessessar byhuh tulkoon."| He finished his unintelligible but eloquent sentence with a palm out to Tsireya. |"Eesee un are webah an shu kneanu bya eltua of ta wata—ut, uh ar streen tuh usso, Avatarh. Hee'ah como tuh usso?"|

Jake met with many olo'eyktans in his day and learned there's a certain unspoken protocol omnipresent in every clan on how to comport oneself when addressing another chieftain. Firstly, he had to defend the reason for his presence, but seeing how he did not arrive by choice and knowing the only way to gain trust was by adhering to what the Na'vi valued most, transparency, Jake bit his lip, swallowed hard his shame, and bared the back of his neck.

The harrowing sight froze both leaders. Tsireya was the first to break silence, declaring, by the immediacy of her words, that they needed to act fast. The olo'eyktan's eyes ran between Tsireya and the newcomer before ending on his lady, and there must've been something in the way his brow muscles loosened that appealed to her ones of stone, for gentler eyes flowed over to Sully, assessed him once more, then surrendered to her mate a yielding nod.

With the unanimous decision reached, the olo'eyktan pressed the avatarh's shoulder as he made a command to his people, and from it, they stepped aside to clear a path. The tsahìk wasted no time; she seized Jake's wrist and briskly led him away. He fumbled to keep up with the unexpectedly powerful woman as she issued high-pitched whoops and broke through the parting crowd that reconnected on their heels. The mer-Na'vi answered their tsahìk with their own fervent hoots, and the augmenting vibration of their chant nearly made the weary castaway swoon. In his dizziness, with eyes threatening to go black from the gathering dots, Jake saw the village he was being led to. The tsahìk ushered him up an elevated pathway that served as an entrance to the network of huts above, suspended on those ginormous prop roots. Colours of blue, green, and brown swirled around his weakening vision as they passed under random sections of triangular shades, thus creating the unfortunate sensation of strobe lighting and worsening his nausea. On top of this, the low, repetitive whisper of swishing water activated his stomach, causing him to nearly teeter off the promenade.

The tsahìk ceased before a hut and nudged the foreigner in. She reached for a roll above the entrance, brought the braided screen down, and the interior went dim.

Jake wobbly faced the woman attacking him with a piercing arcane gaze while he mumbled something along the lines of "Hey, I appreciate the, uh, huge welcome, but I… I…"

The tsahìk caught the collapsing body in a flash, making her stagger two heavy steps back to account for his weight. She was stuck in a precarious spot with her ankles threatening to give, so the woman bided all her strength via one diaphragmatic breath, then shot open her intense eyes—accompanied by a powerful roar—as she executed a reverse deadlift that deposited her patient lightly on a ready mat, herself flopping onto her palms promptly right after, having not undergone something that strenuous since her last labour.

She first hovered her alternating fingers over his body to tap into his energy field; it was weak and overheated but stable for now. That completed, she drifted towards his static face, pressing where the muscles drooped and massaged the area; however, treating it would have to be postponed until she dealt with the most severe injury. Rolling the avatarh securely onto his side, she cradled his head onto a wooden headrest, then quietly studied the trauma.

Soon, the olo'eyktan entered the hut, and when he saw their strange newcomer lying unconscious on the floor, his brows arched. |"Au? Did you knock him out?"|

She snarled at his insinuation. |"He fainted of his own doing. Your avatarh is high with fever."|

The olo'eyktan approached delicately to have a better look, careful not to hinder his wife's operation. |"How serious is his wound?"|

She shook her head, having significantly less hope than her husband. |"His kuru was lacerated and has become infected. It will go into his brain if I do not amputate the rot."|

The man expressed his sympathy. |"Amputate what you will. It makes no difference to him now,"| he hushed sadly. He focused on the beads of sweat falling off the patient's head. |"Pathetic creature. A thing of myths, and he comes to us as fwumsum (sea debris)."|

|"Your myth will not survive if you linger there making commentary,"| she grumbled, trying to undo the decorative cummerbund so breathing wasn't restricted.

|"He dresses as Na'vi."|

|"And of the Skypeople. This alien is both and neither. Pretender."|

|"If only he could talk…"| he mused.

|"Go. Fetch our daughter. She must learn how to perform this surgery. He is her find after all."|

He was surprised by her demand. |"Ronal, she has just come back to us. She is tired from journey and hungry."|

She whipped her head around, eyes pinning on his, but they shone with anguish. |"She left us in heartache for twenty-three sunsets with her sudden txakxängakxip! I will feel sorry for her after I am done being angry. Now go. This thing will be dead before morning if we wait any longer, and you already made a vow to our clan you would help."|

|"He requested utùru,"| the olo'eyktan reminded.

|"Nyah! Tsireya prepped him to bear his neck. Utùru is for Na'vi. This thing is not one of us."|

|"But he was also brought here by one of the tùlkun."|

|"Why do you think I'm tending to him at all?"| she said over her shoulder. Regardless of all her huffing, there was a hint of playfulness in her retort.

He bowed his head in admiration with a humble |"Thank you, my love."|

"Hmph."

The husband finally left, leaving the village doctor to tend to her patient without distraction. Regardless of prejudice, Ronal had too much pride in her skill to allow anyone's health to decline under her watch. She left the avatarh's side, only briefly, to lift a plaited scroll off the wall to then unravel it on the floor next to the alien's head, revealing a serried row of tiny slim knives of crystalline material. Her dexterous hands whisked a scalpel out of its slot. After attuning to its weight, she then delicately sunk the tip into the festering dead skin and began cutting mere slivers away. She was so focused on her task that not even her compact ears flinched when her daughter entered the hut.

Tsireya's eyes bulged, betraying immediate worry for the unconscious avatarh, but she quickly composed herself so as to bow her head in respect. |"I am here, Mother."|

|"Sit,"| the queen commanded, and the princess obeyed, down to kneeling precisely where her mother's dainty finger directed. |"Speak nothing and watch."|

Tsireya did so for a long time as, piece by piece, the queue was scribed till only a millimetre of dead skin remained. Behind the film of rotting tissue were the neural strands of Jake's brain, drained of colour, mangled, and curling upon themselves like singed hair. The blight threatened to damage the most crucial area of his body, but Ronal did not continue.

|"I must stop. These tools cannot touch his eltukìng."|

|"How will—"|

"Saa." Her fangs flashed, once and not fiercely, but once all the same, and her daughter fell back into silence. |"If I cannot go forward, there are others who can. Fetch me a basket of fetid meat."|

Instead of action, the baffling request stuck the daughter to the spot.

|"Go!"|

Without questioning, the young woman flew from the hut, but the sudden switch from dim to light, cool to hot, zapped the fatigued Tsireya of energy with none to spare for her mission. It was at the moment of collapse when a propitious hand caught her arm, and she was set upright by a young man whom she was instantly relieved to see.

"Aonung!"

Not wasting his time with words, he immediately embraced her; and his face tightened in sadness as all the fretting her absence caused returned in one concentrated amount. His black curly hair was controlled into cornrows that evolved into a bun sitting atop his head. Jowls were not present on his young face, but by the firm way he carried his mouth, they would surely form in due time. Pulling back to take in her image, he sighed in relief as the side of his hand fell down her cheek that was too pale for his liking.

|"We all thought we lost you,"| he intoned.

Tsireya was emotional, happy just to be comforted by one set of familial hands. |"Eywa returned me."|

|"Have they let you rest?"|

She shook her head. |"Mother is tending to the foreigner. She sent me out on an errand."|

He inhaled, and it was sharp. |"What was her demand?"|

|"A basket of fetid meat."|

He didn't say anything, assuming the task was a punitive fool's errand. |"Retire to your hammock. I'll carry out your task."|

|"No, Aonung. Mother wants me to do it. You know I am in training."|

|"I'll deal with Mother's wrath."|

She frowned at him.

|"Our parents are punishing you, Tsireya. Can't you see that?"|

|"The avatarh has deadness on his severed kuru. She wants me to learn how to treat such wounds."|

|"The avatarh…"| Aonung voiced in disapproval before resuming eye contact. |"Sister, you're in no state to learn anything right now. No, you are coming with me."|

She resisted once more, but the brother slipped an arm around her shoulder and corralled her against his sturdy frame. He led her away from the ocean towards the jungle, where the bountiful canopy mercifully subdued the sun. As their village stretched into the denser section of the mangrove, he escorted her further over walkways, of stretched bark cloth and netting, till declination brought them down onto the sands. Shady and dry, with enough breeze from the ocean, they walked past the congeries of trunks and entered the pleasantly cool sanctuary of sleeping hammocks: a place where clan members could wait out the heat of the day. It was to their family's old hammock that Aonung sought. Since both children came of age, this swanivia was no longer used; and here, Tsireya was coaxed into laying while her brother set out to fulfill her chore.

He emerged from the den and onto the blinding beach, his eyes adapting relatively quickly to the change. Figures many, employed in the never-ending stream of village tasks, ignored the sea prince as he stood among them. He briefly surveyed the expanse but was disappointed with its offerings.

Also on the beach this day was another young male entertaining a ring of friends. His frizz of teased hair bounced as he relayed exciting gossip. His subject was obvious by the way he held up his four-fingered hand and brought over a fifth from his other.

"Rotxo."

He paused his tale and discovered Aonung standing tall and proud just beyond the heads of listeners. He apologized to the audience and leapt from his stage to clasp hands with his best mate. |"You are just in time. I was running out of material."|

Aonung's lips contorted for an incredulous smirk. |"You should be creating material. You boast about being a storyteller, but you only stick to gossip."|

|"Those are the stories my audience wants."| He shrugged, and all his views on life manifested in that one nonchalant smile. |"So, have you seen the avatarh?"| he asked with wide eyes.

|"No, but I will. My mother is healing him now and wants medicinal components."|

|"Then, let's gather them! I need to see this man for myself."|

Aonung huffed. |"'Man' is too good a descriptor for that pathetic thing."|

Rotxo skipped as he kept up with his friend's strong pace. |"I heard he looked so half-dead insects were buzzing around him."|

|"You're slipping, Rotxo. What happened to always being 'ahead of the game and on scene before it happens'?"|

|"Tarpali stood in my way,"| he grumbled. |"No one could see around that boulder. So, is it true the avatarh's kuru was ripped off by a txopuniltsyìp?"|

|"Ma~? Who told you that?"|

|"Is it not true?"|

|"Did you check first before you told your 'audience'?"| he rebuked, bobbing a thumb in their direction.

The friend's eyes slid away.

"Rotxo…" Aonung chided, then resumed walking.

|"I had to tell them something,"| he defended as he rejoined his side. |"So what does Tsahìk Ronal have us seek?"|

|"Fetid meat."|

Rotxo stopped skipping. "Ìì~?"

Aonung seized a pole off a communal rack of fishing spears. He took a tube-shaped basket and tossed it to the still-blinking Rotxo. |"Get a move on, Storyteller."|

With no luck on the main beach, Aonung helmed a short expedition through the jungle with Rotxo serving as porter. After wading through a lazy river lavished with paradisiacal flora and passing under forking boughs painted in living green, Rotxo stopped in a waterfall of light to bend over and catch his breath.

"Aonung," he called ahead. |"Where do you take us? Listen to all this life, brother. You'd be hard-pressed to find dead meat in this place."|

The eyku turned around, shaking his head at his myopic friend. |"We're not stopping here. My goal is the Uneven Shore."|

|"Out there? Why?"|

It was then Aonung glimpsed a flock of miniature banshees soaring past the arches.

|"The chapxìtu found something,"| he commented and carried on his way.

They arrived on a new beach without sand but stepped hills of black rock, angular and dark, made up of hundreds upon hundreds of basalt-like columns polished smooth by the constant waves, so their flattened tops were always pooling with water. Up and over the barnacle-coated towers, the two carried on, their eyes to the sky, following the gathering swarm of reptilian flyers that were circling farther off. The young men held their footing, navigating the slippery decline towards a massive carcass perched upon the outermost columns. The gold and green aerial beasts alighted on the remains to tear off digestible portions, only to be scared away by the encroaching pair.

Neither Aonung nor Rotxo were happy about finding what they sought.

|"It is another nalutsa,"| Rotxo voiced aloud.

|"It was,"| Aonung remarked as he entered the carcass' shadow. It was only the head that was left intact, but it was more than three times their height. The jaw of its once mighty mouth was slack open, as rigor mortis unceremoniously does to all its victims. Rows of teeth caught Aonung's reflection in their glossy finish when he brushed past their points. The nalutsa's exposed spine, picked clean, coiled down the rock for many, many metres—all that remained of a once terrifying monster.

Aonung fitted his pole pruner and stoically went to work, sawing off portions of the sun-dried cartilage; often, he had to whisk away the pestilence that was everywhere around him.

Rotxo lifted the basket and proceeded to wear it like a top hat as he watched the labourer. |"This makes the fifth one since the start of the season."|

Silent in his task, the olo'eyktan-in-training carried on with undivided attention, but once, and only once, did he let his unhappy gaze drift, and that was towards the red rusted harpoon lodged halfway deep in the nalutsa's flesh.

The tsahìk was displeased when she saw that it was not her daughter outside her entrance but her son.

|"Where is Tsireya?"| she asked. But her acrid tone indicated she already had her suspicion.

|"I discharged her and carried out your request on her behalf."|

|"I asked you to do no such thing."|

|"Mother, Tsireya needs rest, not punishment."|

|"I will decide what Tsireya needs. Now, go fetch her."|

|"I'm afraid it's too late. She's away in a dream."|

The woman inhaled deliberately. |"I see—you are determined to undermine your tsahìk and disrupt the spiritual balance of this village."|

|"Mother, there will be other days to lecture Tsireya, but your son has wisdom too."|

|"Does he?"| she asked flatly as her eldest moved in with filial hands.

|"Yes, and he has seen into the world, and it's saying Tsireya has suffered enough. So I dismissed her so you would not incur the All Mother's displeasure."|

|"So you incurred mine?"|

|"My life for hers."| He bowed his head charmingly, and to some degree, it worked, for Ronal changed subjects.

|"Enough distraction. Where is my fetid meat?"|

Amid this conversation, Rotxo arrived at the entrance, labouring to walk the tall basket along the ground. He struggled to rock it over a lip, and the result was rancid meat splattered across the infirmary. The tsahìk bolted up, baring her teeth at the disgusting mess, and the poor Rotxo had only a second to recover before she was atop him with rebukes.

|"Clean this up, you—!"| She diverted the finger to her son, who was no longer wearing the inveigling smile. |"Gather the zapxap maggots before they scatter. Rush, rush, rush!"|

Since he lost all court with her, the prince of the sea bent low like a servant to help Rotxo catch the grub scurrying from their nurseries of la'ang. The little chimeras that were half larvae, half pincer-wielding crustaceans, were eventually all tossed into the doctor's ready-and-awaiting bowl.

|"That's enough. We have many. Now take this mess outside."|

Rotxo was reaching for the first slimy chunk when Ronal corrected him. |"No, take the whole mat! All of it is soiled. Remove it and clean it free of the odour. The stench clogs my nostrils."|

"Srane, ma tsahìk." Rotxo bowed and let Aonung help as both took a corner and hurried out.

Her clinic cleared, Ronal quickly returned her focus to the unconscious patient, for too much time was wasted in her eyes, and not a second more could be spared. She folded her legs before him, then unfurled her kit of crystal tools. She slipped out a set of forceps made from aquamarine jewel and plucked up the first larvae.

|"Eywa—preserver, destroyer,"| Ronal started to chant as she, one by one, strategically placed the tiny creatures over the remaining gangrene. |"Maker and taker. I see the predator and prey, the scavengers and say, all of your children have roles to play."| Slowly, the maggots began eating away only the dead flesh, while what was still healthy remained untouched. |"Not one without reason,"| Ronal sang, dropping the last organism, |"not one without way. Preserver. Destroyer. Maker and taker. Eywa has reason for us all."|

The sun was betwixt sea and sky when its aureate arms bended off the tide and into the slot of Jake's hut. His tired, heavy lids pulled back several times before focusing on that slit of light, brilliant as gold and dancing on the opposite wall. "Where am I?" is not an unexpected question from someone who wakes up in a hammock inside a strange hut, having little memory of how they got there, for Jake's whole morning seemed to him like a fading dream that he was fast forgetting. Trained routine had Sully grab his right leg and lift it out of the hammock, letting his foot smack the flooring, then continue to do the same with the other; once done, he suddenly went very still, concentrating long and hard on his blue toes. After a pause, he wriggled them, breaking from his daze and returning to his Na'vi world with deep and deliberate inhales. He swung to a stand and appreciated the sensation of being balanced by his own feet. As for where he was, it was a pod-like home of braided fibres and overhanging cloth, Na'vi in style but far from Omaticaya. Sighting his hand, he discovered it had been wrapped in pungent sheets of plant matter. He couldn't understand the presence of the bandage until it dawned on him that his cut from the spearhead, however long ago it was, had been treated. Feeling something else was different, he reached for his kuru. The added weight was from the animal hide pouch it was thoughtfully sheathed in, secured to his redone tswin.

He moved towards the entrance and let the dying sunlight warm the side of his face. The sunset was breathtaking. The uninterrupted bands stretched out on either side till the eye could not follow them beyond the curvature of the moon. Instead, it was Jake's heart that carried onward, floating over the many miles of chaotic waves to a familiar shore, where it then drifted through the bordering forest till it found home in a warm hammock, sheltered from the rain, inside which, three peacefully slept; and there, the projected spirit lay next to a Na'vi woman and reached out its strong, invisible arm to bring in the two children snuggling near.