But if Sylviana felt the need and desire to surrender, Kalus experienced a vastly different emotion: raw and intolerable frustration. He could not understand why Nature seemed to resist him at every turn, in an endeavor which he knew must be put forward and carried out. And the conditions in which he was expected to pull off this miracle were appalling. He had neither saw nor plane nor adze, every day the threat from the returning animals grew, and yet somehow he must construct a boat in which to trust the very lives of those he loved. Each morning he would rise, his back aching from the previous day's labor, and make the five mile journey across rock and open land to the small clearing, there to struggle and shape until the sun began to set. Then the journey back, to a place he could hardly think of as home, and a life which began to seem more and more alien, without the roots of his past. The girl massaged him, encouraged him. But since the night of his full disclosure a subtle wedge had been driven between them, intensified by Kalus' need to concentrate all his energies on personal safety and construction of the craft. It reminded her at times of the way he had spent himself in constructing the barrier to the Mantis' cave, and its later effect on him. But she kept this to herself, knowing that previous labor had been essential as well, and completed not a day too soon. Hidden fires drove him, and if they tended to turn him in upon himself there was little she could, or possibly should do to change it. He became once more an enigma to her, and at times it seemed they met at nightfall like loyal strangers, cast upon a desert island and enjoined, of necessity, to live and work, and carry out disparate dreams of love, together. It was a cold metaphor, perhaps, but there was no denying it. He had been to her, literally, the last man on Earth. And she to him? The fact that he truly loved her, and would have if given the choice of thousands, he could not tell her, and she didn't ask. His love was primal, unquestioned. And though she too had felt these pure, gut-level urgings, she was reluctant to be bound by them, when there were so many other things to consider. And to look at it from every possible angle didn't help. The questions only brought more questions. Only time, and trial, would tell. In the end Kalus' will proved stronger than the knotted wood and lack of tools. The boat was finished and rigged, and the moment was at hand. They waited for a day when the winds were not contrary, then set out together for the clearing, the vessel, and the mystery that lay beyond. Chapter 35