The Summer Dawn

Prologue

The tide comes in and it goes back out. A sweet susurrate of sound that will never end. It can grow louder. It can grow quieter. But the rush of the waves will never cease.

They stand, on the edge, the jagged stone of the ruined staircase digging into the soft flesh of their feet. When the water rushes over their skin, it stings, fresh and painful, over the cuts that mar their legs and ankles. It hurts. It burns. But they do not move.

Beyond them, the water is dark. Black and murky and tumultuous, like hills of ink blotting out the world around it. Foam crests with each wave, little specks of white amongst the endless dark, but it is pulled beneath by the crushing shadow. The sea is breathing. Charred lungs and poisoned air. It has lost its fight with the dark.

As all will.

They think, perhaps, they remember a storm. A storm from when they had been small and unknowledgeable about the ways of the world. One that darkened the sea as it is now. But then lightning had cracked in the sky and thunder and shook the ground. Clouds had filled the air, angry and gray. And the storm had passed.

The sky is dark now, just as dark as the sea. There are no clouds. No lightning. No thunder.

It is not a storm that kills the light, not this time, and this will not pass.

When there was a storm, they sat within their home. Bundled under blankets to protect them from the chill. Their mother, or maybe their father, had read them stories. It kept them calm. Kept them quiet. And before they laid down to sleep, whispers of prayer had been passed between them. Prayers to a god they could not remember.

Now, they just watch. With the hundreds of other people lining the beaches, the stairs,and the ruins of their world, they watched the darkened sea.

And they can not leave.

Because now they have no home to hide in.

And no god to pray to.