Building a decent raft took longer than Tanden hoped. He hated the pace, because it slowed them down but also because the work was monotonous and allowed his mind to wander, which was the last thing he needed. He tried to make himself focus on the work. Finding good sized trees, struggling to fell them with his rusty cutlass, forcing vines to bend as a poor substitute to rope.

They had to stop work in the evening. Jale wandered into the jungle to look for fresh water and fruit. Tanden sat on the beach, staring at their raft even though he had been told to build a fire. Jale had neglected to leave behind her flint, so there wasn't much he could do anyway.

Rustling leaves announced her return. Without turning, Tanden said, "You didn't give me your flint."

"You could have still piled the wood."

"Oh." Tanden tore his eyes away from the raft and slowly stood up. "Sorry. You're right."

Jale put down her armful of fruit and stared at him, her head tilted, hands propped on her hips. Tanden didn't know what she wanted. After a moment, he tentatively stepped towards the scraps of wood they had hacked away from the usual raft pieces. Only to freeze when she spoke.

"I don't know how to help you."

Tanden clenched his hands. "I don't... know what to tell you."

She stepped up beside him, one hand raised like she wanted to touch his arm. But she didn't. Her hand just hovered. They stayed like that for some time. Tanden knew, without having to look at her, that she was trying to say something. Probably trying to think of a nice way to say it.

"Just..." He sighed. "Just talk."

"If being angry keeps you alive—keeps us alive—be angry."

Tanden turned around. "Being angry means—"

"He's dead."

His vision went blurry. He couldn't focus on her. Pressure built in his chest, crushing his heart, squeezing his lungs.

Then he blinked, and Jale came sharply into focus again. There were tears in her eyes. She was devastated, frustrated. He didn't care. Tanden took a step forward. "Don't say it like that. Don't—"

"But it's true." Jale crossed her arms and stared up at him. "It hurts and it's true. You can be angry at me, fine. But you can't be apathetic. You can't shut yourself off from everything. I can't keep us alive on my own. So if you need to focus on a feeling, pick anger."

"I am angry!" Tanden shouted. He expected Jale to flinch, but she didn't. "I'm angry and I feel like I'm being torn apart and I feel like I want to smash that raft into pieces and just swim out into the ocean until I drown. That's how I feel. My feelings aren't going to keep us alive. I can't keep you alive!"

Jale stood her ground. "You said we weren't going to die on that beach."

"Because for some Goddess-damned reason I thought, for a second, that finding and killing Toliver would fix everything. But it won't. I know that, and you know that. But." He stopped abruptly, taking a few deep breaths. His head hurt. Part of him knew it was dehydration. Knowing the cause didn't help. Being angry didn't help.

"But," he continued, voice low, "If I ignore everything, all of that, I can move. I can't think about Soren or Toliver or anything. Because if I do I want to curl up on the sand and just— and I— What am I supposed to do? Even if we find Toliver and save the crew? I can't be on a ship without Soren. I can't. But that's all I am."

"Tanden."

"It is true," Tanden muttered.

"You said you were here," Jale said.

Tanden groaned and dropped to the sand. He still hadn't built a fire, but how could he focus on that with her yelling at him? "I... come and go."

Jale crouched and lay her hand on his shoulder. "You feel lost. It's still such a raw wound, for both of us. But you can heal, as long as we stay alive. In Moatt, you said I never gave you a Tallenese proverb. So here's one. 'The next season is always on the way'. Do you know what that means?"

If he gave it a moment of thought, he could have figured it out. Instead, something else had caught his attention. Jale hadn't needed to translate the proverb. He tore his gaze from the sand and looked at her. "How long have we been speaking Tallenese?"

She huffed and settled back on her heels. "Yesterday. I was muttering to myself in Tallenese and you picked it up. I thought you were doing it on purpose, at first, as a distraction. But you never switched back to Teltish so neither did I. Your Tallenese is better than my Teltish. It was easier."

"Your Teltish is good."

"My Teltish is good," she agreed. "Your Tallenese is better."

Tanden ran his hand over his face. She was right, so there was no point in arguing. "I understand what it means," he said instead. "Hard times will pass, and all of that. But without him, I'm... failing to see the point."

Jale sighed. "I'm struggling, too. I'm trying my best to keep myself together. For our survival."

"I appreciate the effort," Tanden mumbled into his hand, without looking up at her.

There was a long silence. Tanden heard her moving around, and when he finally looked up she was working on stacking the firewood. She expertly built the fire and lit it with her striker. Only then did she take a deep breath and reply in Teltish. "Do you?"

Simple, tiny words. But Tanden felt like she had hit him over the head with them.

Did he?

Yes, of course he did. Because without her effort he would still be lying on the first beach, baking in the sun and letting himself die. But that wasn't what he really wanted. At least, he didn't think it was. It was just so hard to think.

"I'm sorry," he spoke in Teltish after another moment of silence. Jale kept working by the fire, slicing off the fruit's tough skin. "I don't..." He trailed off, forcing his thoughts to clarify. At least for a moment. "I'm finding it nearly impossible to care about myself right now, but that isn't fair to you. Because... Jale?"

Her hand went still. She glanced over her shoulder. Tanden made himself meet her tired gaze.

"I care about you," he said. "I'm... falling apart, but I will keep myself together for you. To get you off of this island." And after that? Tanden stood and joined her by the fire. "And then once you're safe, I'll keep myself together for Ara and the crew, because it's my fault they're in this situation. And if we find Toliver, I'll keep myself together long enough to kill him. After that, I can't make any promises. Just, please, be patient with me. I'll be here when it matters, but I'm not strong enough to constantly be present."

To his surprise, Jale handed him the peeled fruit. Even though he had answered her question in Teltish, she shifted back to Tallenese. "I can be patient, and I can be strong," she said. "As long as I know that I can still rely on you when I need to. So thank you. That's what I needed to hear. Now, eat."

Tanden took that as permission to shut himself down again, and he did so gladly.

***

They woke early the next morning. The water was calm and clear, but Tanden knew the wind was likely to pick up later in the day, so they had to move quickly. As Jale gathered some more fruit to take along, Tanden worked on the finishing touches of the raft.

He was ready to push the raft into the water and get moving, but Jale delayed him by handing him a piece of fruit and half a coconut shell filled with fresh water from a nearby stream. A flash of memory surprised him—Soren standing in the doorway to the captain's quarters, a bowl of spiced porridge in his hand. He was even more surprised to find that the memory didn't hurt.

Tanden dutifully ate and drank. When he was finished, they worked together the push the raft into the water. Jale hopped onto it from the beach, but Tanden waded out, pushing the raft until the water was waist deep. Then he hoisted himself up and took the makeshift paddle Jale was offering him.

They knelt on either side of the raft, with their small stash of fruit balanced in the middle. As they rowed, Tanden kept an eye on the clouds, the wind and the waves. He had to constantly make small adjustments to keep the raft heading in the right direction. Partially to make up for the way the waves pushed them, partially to compensate as his paddling overpowered Jale's. It was mindless work that came naturally, but it was pleasant. Being out on the water always felt right. Even on a poorly made raft.

Tentatively, Tanden let himself think about Soren. Just bits and pieces. Soren giving him food. Soren's steady support. The way he used to get so easily flustered and the new way his voice growled when he was taking charge. The tattoo around Tanden's wrist caught his eye and he spoke out loud without meaning to.

"We didn't have rings."

Paddling didn't come naturally to Jale. When she turned to him, distracted, she stopped paddling. The raft started to spin and without thinking, Tanden's arms moved his paddle to correct the drift.

"What?" Jale asked.

"Keep paddling," Tanden reminded her, before answering. "Teltans—Crelans, too, although they don't share this particular custom—wear wedding rings. Soren and I got our tattoos, instead, in an attempt to be slightly more subtle. Teltans have a custom I quite like, though. When a husband or wife..." he struggled with the word, "dies, the rings are swapped. So the deceased partner is buried with their partner's ring, and the living partner continues to wear their partner's ring. Often strung onto a necklace."

"That's a nice custom," Jale said.

She was speaking in Tallenese again, but Tanden was speaking in Teltish. He liked the challenge of translating her words and his thoughts. It gave him something to focus on. "It is."

"But Crelans don't do that?"

"No. Crelans keep their wedding rings," Tanden said. "I never thought about what we would do, with tattoos. It felt too distant to worry about. Arrogant, I suppose, but... I gave him a ring once. The compass one he wore on his right hand. I wish I had it now."

"Which ring would you have traded?" Jale asked.

Tanden looked at his right hand. His Order ring and his Tandran crest ring caught the light, both of them important in their own way. But important to him, not to them. "I don't know. Neither of mine feel right."

"You'll—" Jale paused as a bigger wave splashed her. She frowned at the water before continuing. "You'll always have the tattoo."

"Yes."

Jale shifted her knees. "How much longer, do you think?"

Tanden eyed the distance they had left, then looked back over his shoulder at the island. Distances were tricky to judge on water, and he was used to doing it from the higher vantage point of a ship. He could estimate distance and speed while sailing, but paddling was different. He answered her question as accurately as he could. "We're about a third of the way."

Jale groaned. "I can't feel my shoulders."

"Don't think about it."

She shot him a look. "Then you better keep talking."

For the first time in days, Tanden actually felt capable of doing just that. He plunged his paddle into the water and pulled it back rhythmically. "You've heard a bit about my brother breaking down my door because he thought I was being killed? Well, there's a bit more to the story. I had bodyguards specifically picked out for me. One man, the captain of my guard actually, was Sir Lord Atricell."

"Sir Lord," Jale scoffed. "Nobles and their titles."

Tanden smiled.

***

They landed on the mainland sometime in the afternoon. Tanden's shoulders and back ached, but it was the satisfying ache of hard work. He dragged the raft onto the beach, even though they didn't really need to save it, while Jale collapsed on the sand with her arms outstretched.

Tanden sat beside her and dropped a piece of fruit onto her stomach, then got to work peeling his own piece. "Now we follow the shore, around the bay?" He tried to picture a map. "There must be fishing towns along the coast of Cray Shia."

Jale began to peel her fruit without sitting up. "I hate to suggest it, I really do, but would it faster to follow the coast on the raft?"

They had no idea what the shoreline looked like. If it was sandy beaches, walking would be easy enough. But he could see mountains and jungle in the distance, obstacles that might be easier to bypass with the raft. "Maybe."

Jale popped a piece of fruit into her mouth. "We're camping here, first."

Tanden took a bite and chewed slowly. When he had finished his fruit, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stood. "You keep resting. I'll handle it." He grabbed his rusty cutlass from the raft, and turned to face the jungle.