14
These days Ay-Bebek tried to live like everyone else, and sometimes she actually did. When Araz went out to sea however, there was no rest for her. Until she saw him safely back in one piece, life was all anxiety.
Today Araz had gone out just before dawn. After the wedding, he had no hope that his peers would change their minds, organize, or resist the relocation order. Rumour had it that on the wedding day Mered Badaly had remarked to his in-law, “we’ll be in the city soon.” Hearing of this, Araz had reviled the villagers to his wife. “Not a one of them would defend their home,” he had assured her, and revealed his own grim conclusion: A people who would not defend their village today, would not defend their country tomorrow, if it came to that.
Ay-Bebek was not fond of her husband’
