The Southwind Saga (Book 3): Flood Tide
Page 31
The bamboo tower and the antennae remained and the solar farm, further to the north and sheltered behind the ridge that ran up Madau like a spine, was untouched by the waves. But not by human hand; many panels had been shattered and batteries smashed so that they spilled their precious acid across the ground like the life-blood of a slaughtered animal. It appeared that Father Livingstone's people had been busy in the hours before the tsunami came. That perhaps half the panels and a quarter of the batteries were untouched suggested they were interrupted in their work. But by what? I cannot say for sure.
But at night, when I am searching for sleep and my skin crawls with a thousand invisible ants, I allow myself a fantasy, that the eruption called the cultists like a moth does a flame. They gathered on the shoreline facing Dalbarade, capering and dancing with the ecstasy of vindicated dervishes. Father Livingstone cajoling them to open themselves to God's Will and face the oncoming wall of water, the oblivion that they have long craved, with open arms.
Queen Victoria, her hull sealed by Martha before they moved up to Dilkawau Passage, rode out the surge unharmed. Her precious cargo of scavenged supplies were undesecrated. Already on that second day, we knew that it was time to leave First Landing. If Piper was right, and Woodlark had truly been scoured of masalai, then it was time to spread back onto the larger island, with its sheltered harbour, secure mine camp and good farming land. And although Queen Victoria had survived for now, we all could see the great bubbles of rust crawling over her hull like the blisters of a pox. It was only a matter of time before she sunk at her moorings.
There was no sign of the green yacht that had long haunted me. We agreed that the tsunami surge carried Aotea out to sea where she drifted forever as a ghost ship. A fitting valediction for the Green Lord.
I never suggested another scenario — one that, never-the-less, filled my thoughts when my fantasy of Father Livingstone end by tsunami took a dark turn: that he and his people were aboard the Aotea when the wave came and that she carried them off into the world, to spread their heresy to other shores. Or maybe, without supplies or the skill to sail Aotea, they themselves became mouldering ghosts to haunt her.
Such thoughts don't keep me awake for long. If nothing else, I've learned to let things go.
A few days after the attack, while Martha coordinated Queen Victoria's unloading, I looked to the southern tip of the bay, where a vast pillar of ash still rose above the horizon. There had been no further shocks or quakes, but Dalbarade would vent for many days to come. My thoughts drifted for a moment over how unreleased pressure would always, inevitably, burst into violent release.
Still, despite the grey clouds that boiled from the volcano, nature went on. A squadron of frigate birds drifted lazily overhead and the coconut palms sighed their secrets to the wind. There was an emerald flash as a kingfisher dived from an overhanging tree into the sapphire water and emerged triumphantly with a gleaming minnow in its beak.
But my drifting thoughts were driven away when a sail crested the rocky headland. I didn't cry out in alarm. Instead I raced to Queen Victoria's top deck where I could get a better view of the small battered canoe and the brave woman that held the tiller firmly in her hands, shaping a course for home.
THE END
A message from Jase
Thanks for reading Flood Tide. Although this completes the first trilogy, there is still plenty of story left in the Southwind Saga as Matty and Zac rediscover the world. Until then, you can get an exclusive free story - see below.
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A DIRTY PEACE: Poetic and haunting, A DIRTY PEACE is a slow-burn espionage thriller that examines the price of peace.
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Also by Jase Kovacs: A Dirty Peace
A DIRTY PEACE takes us to Timor Leste, a fledgling nation still reeling from a brutal occupation by neighbouring Indonesia that left hundreds of thousands of people dead. Now, ten years after independence, the United Nations are preparing to withdraw their peacekeepers.
In this powder keg of old grudges and bad memories, four people hunt a murderer:
Nick, a former infantry officer haunted by a mistake he made in Afghanistan.
Elise, an aid worker healing from a personal tragedy.
Nestor, a child soldier lost in the country he fought to free.
Manasseh, a UN Police Officer forced to define himself by what he is not.
Their investigation plunges them deep into a web of international intrigue when Nick learns of a plot by Islamic terrorists to attack the UN peacekeepers.
Or does he? Caught between Australian spies, the United Nations and local police, they must examine their own pasts to discover the truth.
Poetic and haunting, A DIRTY PEACE draws from the deep tragic history of a beautiful land steeped in tradition and mystery and asks what happens when the war ends and the lustre of peace fades.
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Also by Jase Kovacs: The Silent Circus
1941. The German blitzkrieg plunges into Eastern Europe.
Ten year old Ulis’ childhood ended the night the planes burnt his city to ashes.
As he flees Nazi death squads and Soviet partisans, he is driven deep into an ancient, malevolent forest, his only companion a fellow orphan named Lidyja.
Lost in an endless mire, they are rescued by the strange denizens of a circus hiding deep within the forest. For a while, Ulis and Lidyja think they are safe, having found a new family, a strange and peculiar family of Siamese twins and silent ape kings and freaks and mystics.
But the Ringmaster is dead and the children soon learn that the war outside holds no monopoly on horror.
The Silent Circus is a dark fable in the tradition of Cormac McCarthy. Bleak and evocatively written, it examines the price of survival through the eyes of a child.
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About the Author
Jase Kovacs is a former infantry officer who spent many years exploring South East Asia and the Pacific aboard his yacht Labyrinth. He now lives on the Central Coast in New South Wales, Australia.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE: ZAC
CHAPTER TWO: MATTY
CHAPTER THREE: ZAC
CHAPTER FOUR: MATTY
CHAPTER FIVE: ZAC
CHAPTER SIX: MATTY
CHAPTER SEVEN: ZAC
CHAPTER EIGHT: MATTY
CHAPTER NINE: ZAC
CHAPTER TEN: MATTY
CHAPTER ELEVEN: ZAC
CHAPTER TWELVE: MATTY
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: ZAC
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: MATTY
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: ZAC
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: MATTY
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: ZAC