As Winter Came and Went - Extract 8

And *drum roll* it is the last extract before the publication of As Winter Came And Went! I hope you've enjoyed those little tasters of my novel, and that maybe it made you want to read the whole of it.

This one is situated at the very end of chapter 1, which, according to beta readers is the strangest, hardest to read chapter of the book. Which is making me a bit worried: what if people decide not to go past it? What makes it all very difficult, is that I believe this chapter is, for many reasons, the most important in the whole novel.

Anyway, this odd chapter 1 does have an end, and apparently it gets easier after that (or maybe readers just get used to my odd style of writing?)... And here it is...

End of chapter 1

Land! A rugged misty coastline…if these grey clouds would lift we would see Land’s End… far off…but nearing…nearing… Black-headed gulls fly between the masts and the ropes, screeching that the harbour is ahead.
“When I left, my wife was with child and I had no news since,” the captain is telling the General.
“There might be a fine, hearty boy waiting for you.”
“I would like a girl, to give my son a little sister. He may be there too, on leave.”
Dennys peers at the horizon, at that land he left two years ago. Will anyone have come for him, will they even be aware that he hasn’t died? And how will he face them? And Victoria, who must’ve thought all that time Oliver was alive… Who will they expect to come off the boat? All of ‘em, the sailors, the captain, the crew, the General even, they have wives, children, sweethearts waiting for them on the shore. Homes, a family that cares for them and friends who’ll drink to their health. Ma could have come. She always said she loved him, in spite of everything. She always said she saw him as her flesh and blood. But she must be in Ireland still, having just heard about him being alive.          I’ll have to pick up my life again… To start from the beginning… How could I? Nothing can ever be the same. I’m branded. By their words, by what I lived, by what I did. They drove me to the brink of insanity. They flung in my face all the foulness of human nature. Their greed, their wickedness… Thirst for power, thirst for gold. The worse is that I spiralled down…to fall…as low, almost as low as ‘em… Loneliness, fear, disgust, hatred…
Did I lose my humanity? I wouldn’t be regretting if I had, would I? I’d be thinking I’d been right all the time. I’d have followed them. I didn’t, ‘cause I rebelled. One day, one day stained for ever by the blood that was spilt, I rebelled. I fought for my humanity. I fought against ‘em, like I fought against the desert. I chose the hardest path.
The loneliness was the worse. To be alone with no one to talk to. That’s what almost drove me mad. I ended up talking alone. To hear a human voice. I talked to the stars. I talked to them ‘cause they looked alive and were a link to home. Not the same, but still better than nothing. Better than talking to the rocks. I talked to the camel but it wouldn’t listen. And how could I tell anyone what I had to live through? Would they understand? They’ll say, why did you answer what you did in the first place, for what reason, explain, you brought it on yourself. Yes I brought it on myself. If I’d known... Blood calls for blood. I wish I’d never gone. I wish I could remember more clearly what happened and what I did… Or I should forget everything. As the ragged cliffs advance to engulf the ship. The mist’ll clear, but not for me.