The island must have been some kind of fur farm, before the demic: Lisa’s found rusted-out pens and a crumbling house with tannery racks behind it. But mostly the foxes clued her in.

They’re all human-friendly and uninterested in her food; they seem to eat sweet fallen apples, when they’re not pillaging a busted kibble silo. At night they curl up around her overturned boat and twitch their feet in sleep.

She could give up searching for the prophet, maybe. Stay here, eat fruit, stroke foxfur and dream.

No, Lisa. Sail on.

They cry like children when she goes.