Chapter 13, Saunders Coleson:
Abaraka, the island, was the only shard that touched the Great Beach, a stretch of land that moved over the cracks like an open wound, stopping all water-born traffic with the abruptness of its location. Where the shards were three-hundred-foot-tall cliffs of black sandstone, the Great Beach was black sand, absorbing the heat of the sun and retaining it over the nights, creating a heat sink for miles around. It lay barely above water level for as far as the eye could see. Blasted clean of vegetation—and many believed it lifeless—the stretch of sand was barren to the horizon. They would be wrong, there was life on the beach. It was just hard to find, because to be in the open on the beach courted a quick death.
If not for the region of volcanic activity near
