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“One or two,” Kirilli sniffs “I don’t like horror films Why?”

“You must know, then, that their saliva is infectious When a zo, that person succumbs to the disease and turns—”

“No!” Kirilli cries, dropping the strip of shirt and lurching to his feet “You’re joking! You must be!”

Dervish shrugs “I’ht all be nonsense, but when you think about it logically…”

As Kirilli’s face crumples, Dervish winks at me I stifle a s a coward, but for trying to lie A good scare will do him no harm at all

We drift for hours The sun descends Night clai Kirilli fret for an hour, Dervish finally told hiinatively But he cal about, absorbing the refreshing rays of the sun, thinking about the dead

It all see what I do about the Shadow Mankind has reached breaking point and I can’t see any way forward I doubt if even Beranabus could have ht Certain outcomes are inevitable

Kirilli has spent the last fewit from bow to stern He returns to his seat with a bottle of water and a s the box and looking for oint spell ood news—both oars are on board, there are six bottles of water and this medical box The bad news—there’s no radio equipment or food, and once we drink the water we can’t replace it”

“Do you know if the crew of the ship sent a distress signal?” Dervish asks

“No idea Even if they did, would it have penetrated the ical barrier?”

“Probably not,” Dervish sighs “Can I have some water?”

Kirilli takes a swig, then passes it across “Not too much,” he warns “That has to last”

Dervish chuckles drily “It’ll probably last longer than me My heart could pop any minute”

“Let me check” I place my hand on his chest and concentrate I can sense the erratic beat of his heart He’s in very poor condition He needs hospitalisation or ic If we could cross to the universe of the Demonata, we’d be fine

I try absorbing power fro to tap into and I’th when it rises, but it won’t be enough