Old Green World by Walter Basho

enthusiasm, though, I sometimes forget when God is in the details.”
    Albert, confused, looked at him helplessly.
    “I could say I’ve had to deal with far worse in my life. And I have: far, far worse. But that’s not the point. I’m sorry, Albert. Drink your tea, child.”
    Albert drank. It was perfect: full and the perfect temperature. It smelled like flowers. Albert had never tasted anything like it. “Thank you, sir.”
    Richard looked at him a moment and then put a hand to Albert’s face. It felt like a child’s hand. “Of course, son. This new world, with its big, sad boys.”
    + + +
    They built a beachhead. They found a decent source of water, and set up routines for fishing and hunting, and scheduled patrols and defenses. Albert had to think differently: organizations and dependencies, individuals working in concert, the orchestration of work and people. It was complex. He’d helped his parents with the farm for years, though, and knew complexity.
    The beachhead grew over the weeks, with troops arriving from the west of the White Island and from the Green Island, which lay beyond. The rocky cliffs in the north of the Green Island held immense power. Every Adept trained in the shadow of those cliffs. Every Adept was created there.
    Albert and Aengus went to the shore to greet the Green Island’s boats when they first arrived. The troops from the Green Island wore breastplates and gorgets made of beautiful black iron, the handiwork superior to anything the White Island could yet produce. They saw the tallest and meanest-looking of them and assumed he was Peter, the commander from the Green Island. Aengus gave the salute they had been taught in training. Peter started laughing, then kissed Aengus full on the mouth, then punched him in the shoulder, hard. “They taught the babies well,” he said. He looked at Albert. “What are you supposed to be?” he asked.
    “I command the White Island’s troops,” Albert said.
    “Do you, now?” Peter leaned in toward Albert. “They’re playing army games with you now? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” He sniffed at Albert, then cleared his throat and spat at his feet.
    Albert stood taller and put his hand on the hilt of his sword. Before he could do anything more, Peter shoved him hard, sending him back several feet.  
    “Don’t do something that will get you killed,” Peter said. “Stay out of our fucking way. That goes for both you and your troops.” He walked away without another word.
    The camp and the exposed beach were a mere lip on the edge of the vast hills and forests of Baixa. They watched the woods intently, but nothing emerged from the Baixan forest onto the beach. Albert would sit with the camp guards sometimes. He talked most often with Henry, who was from the Western coast of the White Island, a place called the Horn. Henry had sailed to the Green Island before.
    “We went a few times. You lived by the water, too, didn’t you? You never got on a boat?”
    “I’ve been on a boat, sure. My father and I would sail up and down the channel,” Albert said. “We just never sailed that far. My parents had traveled for years. They didn’t want to go anywhere.”
    “We went a few times to pick up Adepts. That’s where they come from,” Henry said. “They don’t have to use a boat. They can open doors and go anywhere, is what my mother said. I don’t know why they took a boat. Maybe they wanted to be more like us.”
    “What was the Green Island like?” Albert asked.
    “It’s like magic, like you’re dreaming when you’re there,” Henry said. “The Green Island is madness. All you folk from the east, I don’t think you’d be able to handle it.”
    “We can barely handle being here,” Albert said.
    One day, Albert found Aengus comforting a soldier in their tent. He stepped back out to give them some privacy.
    “I want to go home,” he could hear the soldier sniffling from within the tent. “I just want to go home.”
    “I