Epilogue

The sun's light filtered down through the towering fir trees to the smooth surface of the water. A tiny rowboat disturbed the calm, sending out a series of ripples every time one of its two occupants moved. A dark-haired young boy about nine years old was baiting the hook on the end of his fishing pole, observed by the dark-haired man from whom he'd gotten his features and the deftness of his movements.

"This has to be the last cast," said the man. "We told Mom we'd be back by sundown." He looked across the body of water to the tiny cabin on the opposite shore. On the porch, barely visible, a chestnut-haired woman was lounging on a rough wooden bench reading a book, her feet propped against a dog lying in front of her that was probably at least half wolf.

"Okay," the boy replied. In his eagerness to ready his line, he ran the end of his hook into his thumb, piercing the pink flesh of its pad. A drop of blood welled up when the hook was removed, but he took both hands and firmly gripped the pole, tilted it behind his shoulder, and brought it forward in a graceful arc, the baited hook sailing out and into the water with a tiny splash. The wound on his thumb was already healed.

"Good one," came the gruff voice of the man as he watched proudly. As the bugs dancing above the water increased their activity in the setting sun, more fish came up to make them an evening meal, so it was not long before the boy's line had jerked and grown taut from the wriggles of a good-sized trout. He reeled it in patiently with a practiced hand, then removed the hook from its gaping mouth before passing it, tail first, to his father to thump it firmly against the bottom of their craft to kill it and cease its thrashing.

"It's a nice size," Logan commented, passing the catch back to his son. "If we clean it now, we can eat it with the rest of 'em for dinner."

The boy nodded and, unsheathing a bone claw from the back of his hand that was long, straight, and deadly sharp, he prepared to gut the fish.

AN: There is now a sequel to this story, entitled The Island.