Insignia of Loss
an excerpt

Every time life brought on a new good-bye for him to say, a deeper layer of ice was added to something already thick and jagged. Faeden was by no means a naturally warm person, but the coldness he was forced to take on when grunting farewells to his family was almost unnatural. Anything less would have been tangible weakness, though, weakness that he kept deep inside so that it couldn’t be used against him. In hopes of keeping the greatest of secrets, he deepened his voice, lessened his words, and froze the softest part of himself.

Embraces were stiff but familiar. This was, of course, not the first time he and his crew had left to take to the seas, and it was a process that he and his family had adapted to. His children – all three of them – watched him with little emotion, partially knowing that their father tolerated no weakness, mostly fearing that reaction from them might bring reaction from him. His wife – so beautiful and strong – kept herself level, blue eyes fierce and angled features straight, expressionless. There was no touch of fear to be seen in the entire family of five.

There was so much to fear today, though. Once upon a time, patrol ships along the islands of Brill and coast of Toraen were the safest vessels to be found. Time changed that, though, as time often does, and what was once a comfortable job was now a nightmare, a threatening whisper that crept into dreams and iced over souls. Even Faeden, a statue among mere villagers, moved with a tenseness that said his dreams were haunted by the screams of his crew and himself. Sleep was no longer as much a release as it was a continuation of the day’s horrible possibilities.

Somehow, the thought of death did not stop him and his crew from living. Their good-byes were said with hurting eyes and loving tones, their hugs delivered with softest touches and sincerest squeezes. These good-byes were now unfortunate habit, and nearly every family was able to brace itself, shedding few tears and even fewer words.

Faeden’s wife seemed the most stationary and unbending of them all, even more so than her husband. “We will see you again,” she whispered, voice husky and demanding. She made the promise for him, and he swore to keep it by pulling her close, indulging in one heartbeat together in the form of one quick kiss. A few chuckles came from his crew behind, and his youngest daughter found herself hiding her smile by ducking into the folds of her mother’s dress, but his behavior was mostly met with solemn faces, solemn hearts. Even she did not react much; her lips curled into the briefest of smiles, but her expression was quickly that of the untouchable wife she was, stoic and prepared for the worst.

Their eyes locked momentarily, lost for a moment in the love they had shared for eighteen years now. “If that is what you demand, how can I dare to say no?” Faeden eventually murmured back, voice a bit gruffer than his appearance implied. His speech was slightly muffled by the bristling patches of brown that rung around his lips and jutted from his chin, but that didn’t matter. Words were pointless, a farewell game that told much less than his hazel eyes did. There and only there did he shout out the volumes of love and passion that he wished to share but knew he could not.

They were a family too strong for words, you see, and he found himself pulling away from them, nodding to his son and gently touching the foreheads of his daughters before turning to his crew. Faeden could give them and their families no promises. There was no guarantee of safety in this time of new-found world war, and he was not a man who swore something without knowing he could follow up. Instead, all he could do was make promises of his actions, his intentions.

“I swear that we will protect each other as fiercely as we will protect our loved ones and country,” Faeden announced, voice amplified to cut through what was already silent. The sea breeze that was so characteristic of Brill pulled at the hair of dozens of wives and daughters; sons looked up admiringly or put on stony faces to prepare themselves for temporarily taking over the male role in their families. Sea-salt air and sorrow were thick on everyone’s tongues, but Faeden overcame the taste. “…and the day we see each other again will be the happiest day of our lives.”