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Chapter 34
Katrina
Twelve Years Old
“Is it done yet?” Atlas asks impatiently as he jumps up and down behind Levi’s back to take a peek over his shoulder.
“All good things come to those who wait.” Levi winks at him with a smile.
“I hate waiting,” Atlas pouts.
“Come here, Attie. Grab some hay and come sit with me. We can wait together,” I singsong, patting the ground next to me.
With his head hung low, Atlas kicks some of the stable’s hay in his path, picking it up and placing it right next to me. He takes his seat and lays his head on my shoulder, while hooking my arm around his.
“I hate it here,” he mumbles, the sound of strangled tears in his voice. “The ocean is just too far away. I don’t hear it calling to me when I’m here.”
“I know.” I sigh, giving him a little squeeze.
It saddens me how homesick Atlas gets sometimes. Usually, it doesn’t hit him this hard, as we keep him busy enough for him not to even remember his home. But when it does hit him… he’s inconsolable. Today has been such a day, making my heart hurt for my best friend.
“If you hate it so much, then why do you always come?” Teo asks from opposite me, lying on the hay just watching the clouds float in the sky from the small hole in the ceiling of the stable’s roof.
“Because,” Atlas stammers while drying the few tears that made their way onto his cheeks. “Kat’s here,” he says, looking up at my face with a tender smile. “And when I’m home, I miss her more than I miss the ocean.”
I don’t have to look at him to feel Teo rolling his eyes at him. I kick his foot with mine for being so insensitive with Atlas, especially when he’s down. Unfortunately, Teo only chuckles, not one bit sorry that his friend is hurting.
“Cut it out,” I order him, hating it when he acts like an insensitive jerk.
“Sorry, princess.” He winks at me.
“No, you’re not,” Levi mumbles, hearing every word we’re saying, even with his back turned to us, and focused on the task in his hands.
“Once again, Levi. You’re right. You’re always right. I’m not sorry. You don’t see me crying because I miss my home, and Nas Laed is the most beautiful place on earth.”
“Liar,” Atlas blurts out.
“You think I’m lying?” Teo lifts himself halfway off the ground with his elbows just to look over at Atlas.
“You’re always lying,” Atlas defends.
“Not about this I’m not. Don’t believe me? Ask anyone who has traveled Aikyam and seen the four kingdoms. They’ll tell you. Nas Laed is like paradise on earth, placed by the gods themselves.”
“Does it have an ocean?” Atlas questions, still suspicious of Teo’s claim.
“No—”
“Then it can’t be the best place in all of Aikyam,” Atlas quickly cuts in. “If it doesn’t have an ocean, then it sucks balls.”
“Attie!” I chide at his poor use of words, while I hear Levi chuckle under his breath.
“It’s okay, kitten. Let Atlas think whatever he wants. I know the truth.”
“Fine then. Tell me one thing Nas Laed has that is better than where we come from?” Atlas insists. “It doesn’t have an ocean like we do back in Huwen, so the west is already better than the south in that department. It also doesn’t have mountains that almost reach the sky like here in Tarnow. And there is no way your home has caves upon caves of every different colored diamond and jewel you can imagine like the north does either.” Atlas continues to defend his case with such passion that all his previous homesick tears have vanished from his face. “Does the south have green meadows as far as the eye can see like the east does? No. It doesn’t. All the south is known for is its harvest fields and little else. We grow food too, you know? But unlike the south, we refuse to make every single person abduct their own lands just to make them work the fields for spoiled princes like you to get fat and lazy.”
“Attie!”
“Atlas!” Levi and I scold in tandem.
