"Whatever's happened to you, son....maybe whoever did it thought we needed some help. And maybe it knew who to trust." said Maram with a smile, before shaking her head and becoming all business.<br/><br/>"Now then! Get some clean water, and see what food we've still got! There's not much that weren't damaged by the waters, but I'll do the best I can. No slacking off helping your dear old mother now just because you've got a bit of power!"<br/><br/><br/>.....<br/><br/><br/>It was good, simple cooking. Made you ready for anything, Zavros' mother had said. But as the sun was slipping below the horizon, and Zavros was setting off on the road, maybe he didn't appreciate just how broad<em>anything</em>could be.<br/><br/>The stars were becoming visible in the sky, with Luna's face hidden, and savants would have recognised Jupiter and Mars, the astrological embodiments of Secrets and War, passing close together. Coincidences could be a strange thing, but some in the know would have said there was no such thing.<br/><br/>In any case, as Zavros was walking along the beach, he spotted torchlight, and two people looking around the hull of a small ship that had been beached on the shore some months ago, with a gash in the hull that had been too expensive to repair. And for one of them, there was a strange sense of familiarity.