Bastian scanned the shoreline as fast as he humanly could.
The darkness made it difficult to see anything, but based on the location of her voice, the pirate captain soon found Amanda.
She was dragging a heavily injured and bleeding Anasta from the waves.
Bastian could not begin to understand how the lithe beauty had summoned such strength. It crossed his mind that mothers supposedly did such things for their children, at least those who truly loved their offspring. A woman could be a fierce thing, or a soft thing, or anything at all when in severe distress.
He felt a huge rush of love for Amanda, who was now crying against the chest of the witch.
Bastian ran up to them. His chest was burning and his entire body was on fire from the sheer stress of it but he could not let this thing be, he could not leave them.
