Martha had disappeared, as if she had never existed from the very beginning.
Yet the warm touch still lingered at his temples, and the scent of lemon still wafted around his nose—she seemed to have never come, yet she had never left.
Lawrence felt his fingers trembling, he bowed his head, tried several times before he managed to reseal the small bottle cap, and it took even longer to place it back in the pocket close to his chest, his heart pounding—never had his heart thrummed like this, even during great storms at sea.
Rationality arrived belatedly, like awakening from a profound dream, he realized that he had skirted madness just moments before, even almost succumbing to a persistent delusional state, and for a captain who had been adrift on the Endless Sea for most of his life, once caught in such a state, regaining sanity was impossible, yet at this moment he felt neither relief of having escaped disaster nor the lingering dread of having faced madness.
