Exile: The Book of Ever

1: Brokeneck Beach

At the edge of the forest, where the march of pines halted suddenly at the gentle slope of Brokeneck Beach, Ever Oaks stopped to remove the light coat she had put on to fight the morning's chill. The sun had grown hot, and the woolen bodice of her dress was already damp with sweat. The Northeast Kingdom was beautiful in the Month of Gold and Ever loved the crisp weather that usually accompanied it, but this year the summer heat of Bounty Month and Harvest Month lingered. The weather could not seem to decide what it wanted to do, which was a problem when the majority of your clothing was made of wool.

Ever stuffed the coat into her already heavy satchel and slung it back over her shoulder. Brushing a stray pine needle off of her apron, she stepped down onto the rocky scree at the top of the beach and carefully began making her way down. It was low tide and several minutes' walk to the water line, where green waves lapped gently at Brokeneck's dark gravel surface.

The rocks at the head of the beach, a tumble of small granite boulders whose configuration changed with the tides, were not easy to navigate in a skirt, but Ever made a fine job of it until the screaming started. Her breath catching, she teetered precariously between two rocks, one foot in mid-step, and just managed to drop down onto a flat stone a few feet away without falling over. Ever froze, crouching behind the larger of the two rocks, and listened until the sound came again. When it did it was louder, a screeching noise halfway between a yelp and a gobble.

The sharp tension that had formed in her shoulders and her chest relaxed when she realized it wasn't a person but an animal, and not far off from where she stood. Silently rebuking herself for being so girlish, she traversed the remaining rocks and hopped down onto the rough sand a few minutes later.

Why was she so jumpy? The fact that she had left the village without an escort was hardly a big enough infraction that she should startle like a toddling child at every noise. A healer had to have a strong constitution, Sister Hales had once told her, and Ever agreed. She had sown arrow wounds and helped bring babies into the world through cuts in their mother's bellies. It wouldn't do to let loud noises faze her, or worry so much about a walk in the woods.

The screech-gobbling continued, and Ever turned left, looking North up the beach. She had come out of the woods on the south side of a small point, where the beach stuck out slightly into the sparkling green chop of Marvel Sound.

She paused for a moment to catch her breath and enjoy the cool air blowing in off the ocean water. Nerves or no nerves, she was glad to be away from Bountiful this morning. The entire community was buzzing like honey bees in a hive over the upcoming return of the Haglund Mission, and every pair of idle hands was being put to work doing whatever was necessary. Ever was hardly a stranger to hard work, but the Women's Society would expect her to spend every moment she had free from the infirmary baking cakes, decorating halls, and sewing party clothes for the welcome feast.

It wasn't that she resented having to do women's work, or so she told herself, but she did try to give her primary duties priority, and it had been over a month since she had last visited Elder Barrus.

She looked to the right, where the old wooden dock was just visible down the beach near the remains of the ancient causeway, then to the left, where the sound seemed to be coming from. It was only a few minutes out of her way to round the point and find whatever creature was making the awful noise. Whatever it was, it was obviously in pain. She hesitated only a moment before walking left, up the beach, around the rocky point of land.

The view northward was excellent: the broad water of Marvel Sound stretched between the peninsula where Bountiful sat and the long island known as Golden Neck. It was mid-autumn, and the old trees on the Neck were at their most beautiful: the island was a riot of crimson and orange and gold. An old memory suddenly came to her, and Ever found herself recalling a trip to that very beach with her father many years before. She couldn't have been more than—what, eight years old? It must have been around this time of year. They were searching for smooth rocks of similar size and loading them into a wheelbarrow; her father was going to use them to rebuild their cabin's crumbling chimney.