Chapter 17

Laktos barely remembered crawling out of the pounding surf before blacking out on a sandy beach. Hours, maybe days, passed when he felt himself dragged farther up the beach, taken somewhere. He awoke sometime later to find himself lying on a straw mat that reeked of alcohol and sweat. The stench literally roused him from a deep, almost comatose sleep. He gazed around with bleary eyes and saw that he was in a one-room hovel built from driftwood and rubbish by the looks of it. Across the dimly-lit room, no more than five feet, sat an old man. Laktos looked at him uncomprehendingly.

Laktos' benefactor leaned forward in his chair, placed his knobby elbows on an upturned crate, and stared back at him. The old man opened his mouth to speak, closed it as if he'd changed his mind, cleared his throat and then spoke, the words coming out in a drunken slur. "Shwell, lookss like you're nnot gonna to die today, syoung man." He picked up a half empty bottle of booze and drank greedily while he waited for Laktos to answer.

Laktos spoke, his voice barely above a whisper. "Were there any other survivors?" His heart ached for Inga and the fate of his friends weighed heavily on his mind.

 Dreams of Betrayal Page 1 Steve R. Romano