In a way that memory was definitive of all the time I spent at my father’s house. More than anything else, I remembered the lengths and breadths of his absences, often punctuated with strange gifts that I invariably lost or gave away. One such gift, a strange, beaten and battered brass tiara, even now seems inappropriate for a boy of seven. At the time I was well aware that tiaras were for girls and ended up giving it to Sara, my erstwhile neighbor. She was of my age and bound to be my betrothed up until the night she disappeared. That tiara was one of the few things that ever returned to me, found amongst the thick and bulbous reeds of the marshes.

The fog still hid the world from me. Though thoroughly nauseous, I followed my only clue- the stink of fish, clutching to the disgusting familiarity like a drowning man might clutch a wooden well-soiled chamberpot to stay afloat.

It led me through the ruined gates of my ancestral estate, those bound iron spears that had been corrupted as much as fallen to decay.