Branches of Time, The Read Online Free Page B

gleefully and embrace the other sailors, who were still waiting, holding their breath.
    When the rowboats were over three miles away from the ship, the captain gave a signal to the look-out, who blew his horn. The entire crew was swept away in an explosion of joy. For a few fleeting moments, the hierarchy was broken, rivalries disappeared, and divisions between men faded. Officers, sailors and soldiers hugged one another and celebrated as a single man, whooping and shouting into the sky. Even the cries of the birds flying above them seemed to be in the same spirit. Reckless in their revelry, three men fell overboard, soon helped back up by their mates. Even a timid choir sang the praises of King Beanor, whose people had now reconquered the freedom to plow through the seas.
    Finally, the ranks were reformed and the captain gave the order to lift the sails. The ship seemed to fly across the waves. Three miles along, the men and rowboats sent as scouts were collected and the race with full sails resumed towards the South.
    After a few hours of light-hearted navigation, the bowsprit, the wooden beam upon the prow, came crashing down. Then the figurehead was crushed by an invisible force.
    The sound of the broken wood echoed in the hearts of the men. The prow started dissolving into smithereens. The ship, pushed along by the impetuous wind, smashed against the invisible barrier. Soldiers and sailors crowded the deck. Some jumped into the water. The back of the ship, still afloat, quickly started to sink, dragging down the men who held on tightly to the balustrade.
     
    Aldin was in the water. He tried to cast spells that would keep him alive and give him warmth. But no words came out from his frozen lips. He grabbed on to a piece of wood. He looked around: the screams and pleas for help were no longer echoing out into the sky. The water was full of inanimate bobbing objects, which were human beings just moments earlier.
    Did I fail? Is it my fault they're dead? he asked a few seconds before his own heart stopped beating.
 

9
    King Beanor poured wine down the cleavage of the girl lying at his side in the gigantic bed. The liquid traveled towards her navel and Beanor leapt up to lick it. Soon wine will no longer be a luxury for just a select few. We'll grow vines in warmer lands. We'll fill swimming pools full of it.
    His tongue traveled up to her breasts. He closed his lips on a nipple and savored its taste, as if it were the sweetest of fruit. The kind that barely grew on this cursed land. He pounced upon her lips and bit them until she struggled to free herself.
    “Your Majesty!” the young woman protested.
    “Did I hurt you? Little whore!” he insulted her in reply.
    “No, not at all, your Majesty. Please, I beg you, continue,” the frightened girl pleaded, offering him her bloody lips.
    Beanor hastened to suck up the drops of blood. He closed his eyes, inebriated with the flavor.
    Someone knocked on the door.
    “Who is it? Don't you know that I'm busy?” he yelled hoarsely.
    “Your Majesty, I have an urgent message.”
    None other than Tuirl, my incompetent advisor.
    Beanor got out of bed and pulled on a pair of pants.
    “Come in!”
    The prostitute covered herself with a sheet and moved to slip away through a service door.
    “Where do you think you're going? I haven't finished with you yet. Get under the covers and try to stay warm, you slut.”
    She obeyed without uttering a word.
    Tuirl looked down, visibly embarrassed.
    “So? Speak! Or are you waiting for my cock to grow completely soft?”
    “Your Majesty, a few pieces of the ship that set sail three days ago have washed up on shore,” Tuirl exhaled all at once.
    Immediately livid, Beanor let out a disconcerting scream that shook the walls of the palace.
    The eyes of Tuirl and the girl darted about, panicked. Beanor flung the candlesticks to the ground, then grabbed a sword and swung it at everything around him. Tapestries, curtains, furnishings, nothing