Read Two Moons of Sera for Free Online

end.
    “Yep, I made you breakfast. What do I get for it?”
    “Get?”
    “You know, like a trade. Can I have my papers back if I feed
you?”
    “Oh! No.” He picked up the bag and hid it behind him with a
playful smile. “Mine.”
    I shrugged and turned away. “Too bad. No food for you.”
    “Sera make!”
    “Poor Torkek, no breakfast. You must be so hungry.”
    “Food!” he said with a smile.
    “My papers?”
    “Share,” he conceded, pulling the bag in front of him.
    “Deal.” I plopped down next to him and set the plate and
water jar in the sand between us.
    We ate in silence, passing the water back and forth. It
never occurred to me that we shouldn’t be sharing one jar. That was how I’d
always done it with Mother. The simple intimacy of sharing the meal calmed me.
    When we finished eating, I stretched out my legs and dug my
webbed toes into the warm sand. I watched the second moon peek around a cloud
to say hello. Its rare daytime appearance delighted me.
    “Sera?” Tor’s agitated voice broke the silence.
    “Yes?” I turned to find his gaze locked on my feet, on the
thin flesh connecting my toes.
    “Oh!” I said, pulling my knees up to my chest and burying my
feet beneath the sand.
    “You Fish.”
    “No! I’m... I’m Serafay.”
    “Fish feet. Fish toes.” Accusation and confusion warred in
his voice.
    This was the moment my mother always warned me about. The
moment when someone discovered I was different, that I wasn’t Sualwet or
Erdlander. The ground fell away beneath me. Any hope of friendship dissipated
like the morning fog beneath the far cliffs. I buried my head into my knees. A
ball of anguish and disappointment welled within me, fighting to break free in
sobs.
    I breathed deeply, terrified to look back at the man I
barely knew but had placed so much hope in. It wasn’t fair that one person
could move me so much, but considering he was the only person other than my
mother and her few disapproving friends I had ever met... well, it made a kind
of perverse sense. Every breath was a story never told, every moment an
opportunity never taken.
    “Sera?”
    “What?” I whispered, not trusting my voice.
    “Mother. Mother is Sualwet?”
    No sense in denying what the evidence made clear. “Yes.”
    “You not Sualwet.”
    “No.”
    “What?”
    “What am I?” I looked up at him, my tears darkening my
vision. “I’m a mistake.”
    Tor shrugged and cocked his head. “Sera not bird. That good.”
His smile was weak but sincere.
    Kindness and understanding broke me deeper than rejection
could have. Rejection, I had been raised to believe, was inevitable. All my
life I’d been waiting for the moment when I would be discovered, but this wasn’t
it. This was something I’d never dared imagine.
    “Feet,” Tor commanded, pointing at the mounds of sand where
my toes were buried.
    “No.”
    “Yes, feet.” He reached out as if to grab my ankle, and I
jerked away.
    I was unaccustomed to being touched. Even under the best
circumstances, contact was something Mother raised me to avoid.
    “Sera...,” he began, but I interrupted him by taking my feet
out of the sand and letting one rest in front of him.
    I spread my toes and showed him the connective tissue. “I
can’t live underwater. I can swim really well, though, and can stay under for a
long time.” I spoke in a rush, keeping my focus on my toes. “Mother says my
eyes are different, too. The color and the membrane that covers them when I
want to...”
    “Eyes?” Tor waited for me to look up at him.
    When I did, he studied me. The look on his face suggested he
was taking in the subtle differences, now that he knew what to look for. My
irises were larger than his but not as dramatically as my mother’s. Their
silver sheen, unknown among Erdlander or Sualwet, was unique to me.
    “Eyes are nice.” His expression was calm, his voice sincere.
He directed his attention back to my feet but said nothing else.
    “Tor?” I asked