Where the World Ends: Chapters 20–22

They measured the passing of time in months, by the wax and wane of the moon: each moon month, the blink of an eye.

They measured the passing of time in months, by the wax and wane of the moon: each moon month, the blink of an eye.

Their clothes were bird-skin and down. Their legs, mangled by scurvy, were mottled and yellow and crusted with sores.

Even so, hearing the words “garefowl” and “sea-witch,” he cried out as if he had been bitten by a rat...and then the bite festered, and feverish hallucinations again took over his every waking moment.

The boys rucked their lips in blatant disbelief. Birds are birds are birds (except when they are witches or the souls of the malevolent dead).

The boys rucked their lips in blatant disbelief. Birds are birds are birds (except when they are witches or the souls of the malevolent dead).

The island dogs barked at her but were too daunted to attack, and could only watch as she crossed over the rigs and circled the graveyard, plodding on toward Conachair.

It is true that Quill, as he sat up, was filled with a hot bile that slopped around in him like the oil in a fulmar. But that was not the lung fever: it was the fear, the sickening foreboding, the horrific realization of what Lachlan was telling him.

A “murderous zeal” was the only way Don found to describe the boys’ barbarous hysteria and the way they set about the poor beast, in a frenzy of violence.

All over the Stac, boys were unsettled, like fulmars when blackbacks come ripping out of the sky. They stopped their leisurely hunting, and hunkered down, holding still.

Farriss was first out of the boat, going over the rail so early that the water came up to his neck. He floundered ashore and set off to run up into the village.

One by one, the boys, too, set off to run toward their houses.
The Street itself looked disheveled and careworn.

The kind of things Davie’s mother would want to hear about.
Inside his head, Quill started to concoct what he would tell her, what he would not.

On the Stac, they had been kith and kin to one another...But Quill’s mind would not apply itself.

For when the smallpox broke out, she had stayed on in Hirta, nursing the sick tirelessly, comforting the dying and the bereaved, and being a veritable mother to all the little orphans.

For when the smallpox broke out, she had stayed on in Hirta, nursing the sick tirelessly, comforting the dying and the bereaved, and being a veritable mother to all the little orphans.

He made no mention to Reverend Buchan of his “vigil” on Boreray: the Reverend was a shrewd and educated man and might ask a lot of questions that would be too difficult for a humble man like Col to answer.

He made no mention to Reverend Buchan of his “vigil” on Boreray: the Reverend was a shrewd and educated man and might ask a lot of questions that would be too difficult for a humble man like Col to answer.

With luck, the other members of the fowling party would be so devastated with grief over their own losses that they would quite forget the matter of the girl John and his need to requisition the raft.

It would not do for his small and scratchy wife (who had survived the smallpox) to get wind of any such scurrilous gossip.

Stalwart through cold, hunger, fear and provocation, he had shed not a tear on the Stac.

Stalwart through cold, hunger, fear and provocation, he had shed not a tear on the Stac.

No passengers—said he could not risk carrying contagion to the mainland.

And I remember, I brandished a book at him out of my pocket and accidentally hit him on the cheek with it and felt badly because his skin looked sore, and scarred like mine.

“You are staying, so?” he deduced from the fact that I was up here and the boat was down there.