Rowan’s wife, Camilla, invited Dee to come eat the noon meal with them at their caravan. Dee accepted gratefully. Once there, she was quickly introduced to the rest of the family: Camilla’s mother, Rose; Camilla’s younger brother, Declan, and his wife, Teresa; Rowan’s younger sister, Maeve; and Rowan and Camilla’s children, Aran, Nora, Einri, and Ciara.

They were a lively bunch, especially the children. Even considering the solemnities of the morning and the somber tone it brought upon the village, the Rivule Verdans still somehow managed to converse cheerfully amongst one another. To Dee it was a welcome reprieve after the heavy argument she had just witnessed between Xan and Taika.

Ciara in particular seemed drawn to Dee. When Camilla summoned the family to sit around the large fold-out table where lunch was set, Ciara made a point to sit next to her. The young girl eagerly scarfed down her meal, then immediately began to query Dee.

“Did ye really fly here all the way from Vaimea?” Ciara asked. She happened to pose her question right as Dee took a bite, so Dee just nodded and grunted.

“That’s so amazin’!” Ciara exclaimed in awe.

“What’s so amazin’ about that?” Einri interjected. “People fly in airships all the time.”

“It wasn’t an airship, it was a rowboat. I saw it!” Ciara said with a pout.

“That’s impossible,” Einri snorted. “A rowboat can’t fly.”

“It can, it can! This one did. Right, Dee?” Ciara asked, turning back to Dee. Dee quickly swallowed her bite of food.

“Well, technically it’s not a rowboat—” she began.

“See! I told ye!” Einri said.

“Einri, be nice to yer sister,” Camilla warned with a sharp glance. Einri quickly lowered his eyes and began concentrating very hard on his plate.

“But it did fly, right Dee?” Ciara asked Dee.

“That’s right,” Dee said. “It took us a few days, but we made it here in one piece. Well, mostly. The mast is kind of missing right now.”

“That’s goin’ to be a rough fix, I bet,” Declan interjected.

“It won’t be too terrible, as long as I can find a spar big enough to do the job,” Dee said.

“Say, Dee,” Aran spoke up now, “I’ve always wanted to know, how exactly do ye get an airship to fly?”

“Well, it’s simple, really,” Dee said, tilting her head as she thought. “Each ship has a Terra Sang attached to it, usually in the hold somewhere. The Terra Sang lifts the ship off the ground. Then the crew uses the sails to steer it, kind of like a kite.”

“A kite? What’s that?” Ciara asked.

“A kite? Well, it’s… it’s kind of like… well, here, let me make you one,” Dee said.

The children quickly gathered up the materials Dee requested, and in a few short minutes she had constructed a small kite out of a square of old cloth.

“How’s that supposed to fly?” Einri asked, looking skeptically at the kite.

“All you need’s a breeze,” Dee said. Then she wet her finger and held it up. Noting the direction of the wind, she began to run, pulling the kite behind her. It caught the wind and rose up quickly, tugging hard on the string wrapped around her hand.

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The children all stared up in awe as they watched the kite rise higher and higher. Then they began to cheer as it cleared the treetops.

Dee tugged on the string, guiding the kite away from the prickly pine branches. Then she motioned for Ciara to take it.

“Here, you can fly it, too. Just keep it away from the trees,” she said.

Ciara excitedly grabbed onto the string. She giggled as the kite danced on the wind. Then she ran, pulling the kite behind her while her siblings followed excitedly, each eager to have a turn. The corner of Dee’s mouth turned up in a smile as she watched them.

“That’ll keep them occupied for a while,” Camilla said.

“Then I’d best take advantage of that. I’ll be back,” Dee said. Then she turned and started heading towards the costal edge of the village.

After Katar’s passing, their little boat had been returned to the mainland. It now sat close to the cliff’s edge on the outskirts of the village, in full view of the gigantic tree.

Dee hopped up into the boat. She looked around once to make sure no one was looking. Then she surreptitiously unlocked the lockbox and opened it. The Terra Sang was still there, faintly glowing from within its shadowy confinement. Satisfied, Dee closed and locked the lockbox. Then she turned and surveyed the ship again, seeing if there was any more repair work that could be done. She quickly determined that there was none – at least, not any she could do on her own, and not without the right materials. So instead, she laid down on her back in the rowing well and stared up at the sky.

The gray clouds scuttled by high above her. She envied them. They could still ride along with the wind, while she was in a place far away from home, stuck on the ground with a broken ship. A feeling of homesickness washed over her. She sighed and laid an arm over her eyes.

“Auntie’s not going to be happy when she finds out the boat got wrecked,” she muttered to herself. Not like that was her fault, she reasoned. Xan was the one who wanted to push through the night. And he wasn’t paying attention when Taika warned him about the tree they crashed into.

In fact, the more she thought about it, the more the homesickness she felt was quickly replaced by anger at the both of them. It was Xan’s fault that they were in this mess to begin with. And Taika, she had called Dee’s idea a cockamamie plan. The same idea that her Aunt Stell had said was brilliant. The same idea that Dee had been so proud of, before the crash, before everything seemed to have gone wrong.

“I was just trying to help!” she suddenly cried out, thumping her arm against the side of the rowing well. The boat rocked at the sudden strike, startling Dee. She sat up and held her arms out to the side until the boat settled.

Dee sighed again. Then she hopped out of the boat. She walked over to the cliffs. Bending down, she picked a handful of pebbles and began throwing them one at a time over the edge.

“Not like you needed any help,” she said ruefully, punctuating each sentence with another thrown pebble. “Never mind that Auntie willingly handed over one of her boats and a Terra Sang to complete strangers. Never mind that I volunteered to leave my home behind just to make sure you got here in one piece! Never mind that we all risked life and limb on the chance that we could help you! And you say it was all for nothing?!”

She hurled the rest of the pebbles over the edge with as much force as she could muster. Then she watched as they tumbled through the air, startling a flock of seabirds that were flying by. She breathed heavily for a couple moments, letting the anger flow out. Then she sat down wearily on the ground.

“Well I didn’t do it for you. I did it to help Auntie,” Dee said with a note of finality.

She sat there at the edge of the cliffs for a long while after that, just watching the seabirds. One seabird in particular seemed bent on flying into the headwind that was blowing through the channel. He would flap his wings for a bit, making some headway, and then he would glide, allowing the wind to push him back. This went on for several minutes. Eventually Dee chuckled at the little seabird.

“Trying to fly against the wind, huh?” she said aloud.

Then she sat up straight. An idea was forming in her head.

She pulled her notebook out of her satchel and tore out a piece of paper. Working deftly, she folded it into a little paper bird, its wings stretched out mid-flight. She held it up, letting it wiggle in the breeze for a moment. Then she tossed it over the cliff as well.

The paper bird glided for a long while, spinning about in lazy circles, until the wind buffeted it too much. It crashed against the cliff wall, far out of sight. Dee looked back at the little seabird. He was still flying against the wind, rising higher and higher as he did so.

She opened her notebook and started to sketch.