Finder's Shore Read Free Page A

it be otherwise?”
    The half-light that filters from a window is too dim to allow me to read Ronan’s expression. I match his question with one of my own. “Are you happy here, Ronan?”
    Before he can answer — if he intends to — the door of the grain store opens and Truso crosses the yard. For a moment I think he’ll pass us by, but he slows and peers into the shadows. “Ness. Ronan. Everything all right?”
    “Fine,” I say.
    “Varn,” Ronan tells him.
    Truso grunts. “As if we haven’t enough to deal with. I’ve a mind to send him back to Vidya.”
    “He works well enough,” Ronan says.
    “Complaining all the while. The man’s a loud-mouthed fool. They trawled for dregs when they resettled this place.” He waves a hand in denial. “You didn’t hear me say that.”
    Beyond his shoulder, the yard falls in sharp relief, the outbuildings stark against their sensor lights, the gates manned by sentries. Truso lets out a gusty sigh. “Sometimes I wonder about the governors’ real intentions.”
    A voice snakes out of the shadows behind us. “The governors have no option but to hold the line.” Brenon steps into the light. “If we lose Summertops, we’ll have both renegades and Paras on our doorstep. Summertops is our buffer.”
    “We’re not here as a buffer, we’re here to farm,” Truso says tiredly. The conversation has the feel of a well-worn path. “If we can’t do that, then maybe we should walk away.”
    Shock ripples through me. I’ve never heard Truso talk of giving up, not even during the worst of the attack last summer.
    Truso takes a breath and lets it out noisily through his teeth. “Sometimes I think it’s time I stepped aside. Let someone else take over.”
    “No!” The word bursts from me. “No one could have pulled things together the way you have,” I tell him. “You’ve done wonders at Home Farm. It’s harder here, that’s all.”
    As my voice trails off, the door behind us opens. Tino nods a greeting. “I heard about the fracas over dinner. My apologies, Ness.”
    They’re all making too much of it. “It was nothing.”
    Tino shakes his head. “There’s no excuse for rudeness.”
    A burst of conversation from the hall saves anyone from answering. What could be said, except that it shows up the cracks in the community?
    Tino shifts awkwardly. “Truso, if you’ve a moment, I wanted to talk about that mob of ewes we’ve been running on kale.”
    I let my attention wander. There were sheep on Dunnett but not on my Uncle Marn’s farm, and Dunnett feels a long way away from Ebony Hill: farther than ever. A wave of homesickness curls through my chest, catching me by surprise, cresting and breaking on the rocks around my heart.
    “Is something wrong, Ness?” Ronan asks.
    I force a smile. “I was thinking about Dunnett, about how far away it feels.”
    Ronan’s expression for a moment echoes my emptiness. “Come on,” he says, turning abruptly. “You should try Tino’s fermented barley juice — everyone should taste it once.”
    In the kitchen a handful of scouts are on kitchen duty, and a line of plates stands drying along the bench. “Here.” I pick up a dishtowel and toss another to Ronan. As he glances past me, the smile drops from his face. I turn. Jofeia stands at the sink, her arms lathered in soap. As I watch she tilts her head, a sleepy smile on her face as the man at her side bends to murmur in her ear.
    When I turn to Ronan, he’s gone. A year ago, at Home Farm, it was Ronan who had captured Jofeia’s attention — or the other way round. I adjust the assumptions I’ve made and follow him back out into the night.
    He’s standing just beyond the pool of light that falls from the windows. “Ronan? Is everything all right?”
    He lifts a hand to quiet me. “I thought I heard something — a cry.”
    It wasn’t what I meant, but we stand together in the darkness, ears tuned beyond the tall fences and stout gates of the compound. Nothing