After reaching forty-five--part of his mind screamed to Yili that he was perhaps even more foolish than he had been those years ago--Yili told the tale of his encounter on the beach.
The people were taken aback, as he would have expected them to be. Had he not been there himself, he would not have believed such a turn of events possible, either. And yet they happened; he was living proof of it, and so was his burden.
The elders frowned, all of them, their expressions troubled. Then they retreated to confer amongst themselves, pausing only to tell him to place the strange woman down on a pallet in the hut nearest the central bonfire. The hut belonged to Pao, Neela, and their small daughter Teya, but they did not complain. If anything, they seemed honored that the elders had deemed their h
