The Fall
Page 21
“Originals.” It’s not a question. I do not answer. For the moment, Isaiah is lost in thought. “Stand with me here, Char,” he says. “We’ll take the first step together.”
I slosh through the churning tide to take my place at his side. Our settlement looms large on the horizon, and only half-lit as yet. Ours are not the first human steps in this alien world. We’re not the first explorers here, the first builders. We will not be the last.
The rocks sink beneath my feet, and he reaches out to steady me. “Earth below. Fire above. The city ahead.” He offers me a smile, and I do my best to return it. He shoulders his pack and takes the lead, stuffing his space skin through a strap, pulling the mouthpiece out of the helmet, around his shoulder, and up to his lips, breathing in the oxygen.
Soon, the forests and the ocean will supply more oxygen than we could ever need. We will build cabins among the trees and watch the pines grow tall around us. We walk together without speaking as the art burns to ashes overhead.
It will take years to restore the things we have lost.
Around me, the fire-streaked sky is lit by the first tendrils of dawn. My first sunrise in eight years. I will shake the persistent dusk from my mind. I will yet go forward.
We reach the city, and I remember the first time I met Ce-ya and the feel of her fat, tiny arms against my neck, and my heart sinks down into the earth beneath me. But the inner lock opens, and I am beckoned forth. I am needed. I have Eren. In time, we will build a family of our own, and we will choose them, every day of their lives. And they will know it. I swallow at the thought, pressing my ribs out, straining against the tightness in my chest, in my throat, but its grip is too deep.
I will yet go forward. I can still be strong without them.
Their faces run through my mind, over and over, like the waves of the ocean, and I smile in spite of myself.
I can still be strong because of them.
“Welcome home, Senator.” A bright young woman wearing a simple green robe extends a hand, and I move forward to grasp it. I cannot help the grin that spreads across my face. I lift my chin and step into the city, where Ise is waiting.
We have work to do.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to God for loving me. I’m also grateful for the following people for enabling (and even encouraging!) my writing habit over the past several years: Will Nolen, Morris Liddell, Ben Morris, and Jenna Wolf. They’ve lit the path I’ve travelled alongside Char from beginning to end.
Enormous thanks to those who have read my work and taken the time to write to me about it, or who have even gone so far as to leave a review. I’m deeply touched.
Thank you, Natasha Bardon. Thanks to all the lovely people at HarperVoyager UK, past and present, including Eleanor Ashfield, Jack Butler, Rachel Winterbottom, Lily Cooper, and Jack Renninson, who have helped in the promotion and publication of this series.
Thank you to this book’s aunts and uncles, who have made a point of supporting me, and thanks to my family! (Hi, Mom.) The list is long, but here are a few names off the top: Will, Ava, Liam, and Oscar. Lesha Grant and Aundrea Leven. Courtney, Alex, Jennifer, and Jordana. I love you!
Also by Laura Liddell Nolen
The Ark
The Remnant
About the Author
Laura Liddell Nolen grew up in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. She has a degree in French and a license to practice law, but both are frozen in carbonite at present. She lives in Texas with her husband and two young children. The Ark was made possible in part by a SCBWI Work-In-Progress Award. Laura can be found on Twitter @LauraLLNolen. This is her first novel.
About the Publisher
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