Rook and Sparrow are sitting on the wall of an old ruin, two painted figures against a sunrise that looks no less like a work of art. Sparrow keeps picking up little chunks of wall and dropping them into the leafy overgrowth below, just to watch them fall. Rook is looking out at the ocean with a spyglass. Behind them, in a campsite set up throughout the ruin, the crew of a merchant vessel is mostly asleep.
Suddenly, Sparrow laughs. He nervously runs his hand through his hair, looks around, then leans against Rook. Rook is as surprised as can be expected, considering that he and Sparrow have a linked headspace, but he is surprised. He isn’t sure what to do, but he thinks he should put an arm around Sparrow, and that seems to work out alright. They don’t really do this, don’t really show affection in such direct ways. After a time, it just feels weird, and they go back to their respective preoccupations from before.
When the ship ran aground and started to sink, Sparrow was not okay. He’d discovered a worry that the sailors would think of his powerful magic and identify him as responsible for coming up on deck and fixing everything (he wouldn’t know where to start). He’d discovered the worry, and then he’d gotten lost in it. He was raised to be a sacrifice; he expects it’s only natural for people to treat others like objects the moment their conscience finds an excuse. Why shouldn’t a sudden emergency make him an resource? He privately accepted death many times over as the vessel slowly drowned, even as he hid and shrunk from the concerned crew members actively trying to save him.
His worry was not baseless. Sailors have chosen Jonahs for less. Perhaps the sailors would have come for Sparrow as their unwilling savior in exactly the manner he feared, if he had explained in detail why he was worried that they would. But the way things turned out, they simply didn’t think of it. They work well as a team, and they just aren’t in the habit of classifying passengers as helpers and advisors when it comes to doing their job. In their experience, passengers trying to intervene is usually a bad thing.
Now, a few days into their makeshift new life on this island, Sparrow is finally starting to believe that he won’t be forcibly assimilated into this group as a prop. He shares a headspace with Rook, he doesn’t have to explain in words. A short laugh at sunrise is enough. He will be himself again soon, back to having too many opinions and telling people what to do. He’ll probably even find ways to help out the group. It felt good to help fix a lighthouse, some months ago. Rook is relieved too. He soon starts to frown, though. As their personal clouds start to clear, he can spot a few iffy looking real ones on the horizon. Again?
By noon, the group is scrambling to make a dry shelter of the ruin, as rain beats down furiously. The cook makes a remarkable discovery: all this time, the place had a lower level. Potentially several. How large of a structure is or was this place? And how safe is it to explore, or to even make camp so close to something unknown? What if there are people living down there? There are a few lookouts posted, but no one is really expecting an interruption from anywhere but below.
