CHAPTER 28

Ada swallowed uneasily and smeared her dried lips with the little saliva left in her mouth. She couldn’t keep her eyes away so she watched his muscular features again. The lines on his body—made by his muscles—disappeared and reappeared in a uniform rhythm, as he coursed the canoe through the nation of blue.

They had long lost the brown and green shoreline to the vast sea, which spreads through the vista as far as the eyes could see. Even though the sun pricked the earth with its heat, the moist air still sheltered the rays, but not enough to cloth the body with a cold that could make the hair on the skin to stand.

“How far. The land of the barbarians?”

Ikedi dropped the oar as the canoe caught the current. It