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Well, it did before the Qit was destroyed. Except it wasn’t destroyed. I could have sworn it was destroyed, that it all was destroyed. Yet there it was. All of it. All in one piece.
There wasn’t a smolder of smoke in the sky or a scorch mark to be seen. All I could smell was the salt of the water and the stink of the fish. All I smelled was home.
“’Ey! Boy! You ’right down ’dere?” Water splashed as I spun at the voice, salty foam bobbing around me as I faced the man on the dock, his large hand held out to me, his sun-parched face worried and skeptical.
“Yeah…?” At least, I thought I was. I had no idea what was going on or what had happened. Had all of that been a dream, or a sun fever? Had I fallen into the sea during line-call yesterday? I didn’t remember. All I did remember was the dark and the fear… Everything had been on fire. Lily had just… Lily.
“One segond ’dere was jest wabes, and ’den the next, you art ’dere. Me and ’enry got a bet ’dat ya were a Mer, but I’d seen your legs kid’king…” His dialect was familiar on the Qit, the same one Da spoke to the Wave Walkers that traveled from Qit to Qit and took small jobs in exchange for fish and coin. My father had more than a few that worked on his boat, but I barely heard him. I grabbed his hand and let him pull me up. “My… Doze be sum inters’tin eyes–”
“Yeah, I’m fine. I just need to get home.” I barely heard him, I was still staring around at the perfectly intact Qit.
Everything was there.
Everything was fine.
I didn’t let the Wave Walker respond before I ran. Water sprayed from me as I bolted over the wood walkways of my Qit, my sodden nightgown twisting around my legs. Rough wood pushed painfully into the calluses on my feet. It was as though the sun- and water-worn planks I was familiar with had been recently replaced.
People stared, a few yelled, but I ran right to my front door without looking back. The front door that was intact. Perfectly intact.
Had I really imagined everything? Please let me have imagined everything.
“Ma! Da!”
My throat was tight, my heart exploding as I yelled, fiddling with the latch that had somehow turned into a knob. The door opened on strangely quiet hinges, the bright room that was my home coming into view.
“Lily!” I yelled her name, ready to run to our bed, sure she was there, sure everyone was worried about me.
She wasn’t there.
The bed wasn’t there. Nothing was where it was supposed to be. The pretty lilies painted on the cupboards were gone. The big bed where my parents slept was pushed into the wrong corner, an unfamiliar rug underneath it.
“Hey! What in the Goddess’s name do you think you are doing?” A bark of a voice pulled me from my shock, and I jumped, more water falling from my nightshirt.
“I… I’m…” I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what had happened. “This is my home.” But was it? Nothing was right, and where was Lily?
“No it ain’t, you fish! Out! Out!” The man emerged from a bed, a frightened woman screaming as he charged me.
I ran before he could reach me.
Frantic feet pounded against the rocking walkways and carried me out the door, over the rough wood, and toward the center of the Qit.
A Qit that floated without damage and a house that was wrong. My eyes burned, my throat tight in panic as I darted through everyone who was just going about their day. A day that shouldn’t be there.
Maybe it hadn’t been a dream. Maybe all of that had happened, and everything had been destroyed. But then where was I? Had I floated to another Qit? Da had said they were all different, but this one was exactly the same as Waide. Even the big shop and fish markets by the square had the same names. Waide’s Fin.
The number of people on the boardwalk increased as I reached the center of the Qit. The small square that was always barren was now crammed with people. Fruit stands, honey shops, milliners, and bread sellers circled around a large fountain of a kraken that stood in the center of the Qit. The same statue had stood forgotten in my home, the broken bronze surrounded by banners of the queen. But now it was polished, water flowing from the mouth of the beast to pool by its tentacles. I didn’t even know it did that.
The white snake was gone, too. Everywhere those vile banners had been hung, they were replaced by banners of shimmering flags of purple and gold. The sigil of a white crown surrounding feathered wings waved in the pungent air of the sea, the chilled breeze pulling at my hair as I looked up at the glorious flag.
The sigil of the Ramal.
“A bun for you!” a woman with rosy cheeks said, shoving the still warm pastry in my hands.
“But I can’t… I have no money.” Or any idea what was going on. I couldn't make the words come. Tears welled in my eyes as all the fear, all the panic I had been pushing away since I awoke to wet ashes, came pouring out.
“Come now, pet,” she crooned, kneeling down and grinning with green eyes almost the exact same shade as my mother’s. “There’s no need for tears. Not on a day like today.”
“What’s today?” I asked, suddenly hopeful. Maybe I could figure out what in the world was going on. Maybe there was a chance I could still find Lily.
