Kota moved like one condemned to the gallows, walking toward that rock as though he were climbing the scaffold: head down, feet shuffling, and sighing deeply. When he got to the rock, he didn't sit; after sitting so long in that boat he didn't want to do more sitting, and after figuring out where they were, he had enough pent up, nervous energy in him that idleness was impossible.
So instead he took to pacing in front of the rock, throwing fleeting glances at the boat every now and then.
"Hey now, I'm not skittish...exactly," he said, and made a face. "And it's not really about the fruit, it's just...it's just I know this beach. And I know that if we follow the beach east a ways, maybe a mile, we'll reach a village." He stopped his pacing and looked at Morgan, a pained expression on his face.
"My, uh..." He kicked at the sand. "My hometown, to be exact. And I really, really, really don't want to go back there. Really. In fact, I can't!"