POV: Beth
The ocean turns on us without warning.
One moment, the brig glides under a soft morning sky. The next, clouds swallow the sun whole—bruised, violent things rolling across the horizon. The wind sharpens, slicing through air like knives. Waves lift us, drop us, lift again.
The world becomes motion.
The first thunder cracks so close my ears ring. Sailcloth snaps like whips overhead. Riva shouts orders from the rigging, hair plastered to her face. Kaine curses the gods fluently. Bram braces the mast with bare strength.
Alaric stands at the helm like a madman, hair whipping loose, coat soaked to skin. He grins—actually grins—as lightning forks across the sky.
He looks alive in the storm, as if it belongs to him.
I, however, barely remain upright.
Rain slams sideways, cold needles piercing through clothes. Deck tilts sharply. My stomach lurches and legs buckle. I grasp the nearest rope, fingers slipping over soaked hemp.
Water rushes across planks around my boots. The sea roars like something ancient waking from sleep.
“Beth!” Alaric’s voice slices through wind. “Move your feet—become part of the deck!”
“I’m trying!” I shout, though wind swallows half the words.
Another wave crashes over rail and drenches me head-to-toe. Salt burns eyes. My hair plasters to face. I push it away with shaking hand.
A rope snaps overhead with a gunshot crack.
The boom swings wildly, sweeping the deck like giant’s arm. I duck barely in time—it misses my skull by inches.
Heart claws inside ribs.
“Secure the main sheet!” Riva yells. “Girl—help me!”
I stumble toward her, pulling rope the way Alaric showed days ago. The storm mocks every lesson. My fingers slip. Rope burns skin. Riva ties half the knot herself while shouting at me over thunder.
“You’ll lose fingers if you grip wrong!”
Too late—another yank tears rope through palms. Pain sears, sharp and hot. Blood mingles with rain.
A wave slams the brig’s side with such force we tilt dangerously. Kaine bellows for balance. Niall fires pistol at sky in frustration, though no bullet can kill weather.
My knees hit deck. Hard.
Wind screams. Waves pound. The world becomes white blur and black water.
I crawl—humiliated, terrified—back to a rope, grab it with raw palms. Another wave rises like mountain and crashes over us. Cold erupts in my lungs. For a moment, I can't breathe.
Deck tilts. My grip slips.
Then I am airborne—thrown toward the railing, toward the ocean mouth waiting below.
A scream tears from me—high, raw, swallowed by thunder.
Something brutal clamps around my waist.
Alaric.
His arm locks like steel, wrenching me back against his chest as water surges around us. We slam into deck together; his body cages mine, shielding from falling debris.
For one suspended moment, we breathe the same storm-cold air. His heartbeat thunders against my back or maybe it's mine trying to escape.
His grip on me is too tight, fingers digging into soaked fabric like he refuses to let the sea claim me.
“Stupid princess,” he mutters into my hair, voice rough. “Hold the rope. Not your breath.”
He stands first, hauling me up with him, hand never leaving waist until he confirms my feet are steady. The hold lingers half a second longer than necessary.
Then he drops it.
Warmth ripped away leaves frost where it was.
He shoves a rope into my hands. “Tie it! Quick!”
“I— I can’t—”
“You can,” he snaps. “Or you drown. Choose.”
He doesn’t say please. He doesn’t need to.
Lightning spears the night ocean, turning waves silver. I force trembling fingers through loop—one, two, wrong. Again. Again. Rain blinds. Blood makes rope slick.
“Use teeth if you must!” Riva screams down from mast.
I do. Salt floods mouth. Rope fibers scrape tongue. Knot sets. Ugly, but holding.
Alaric throws a glance—unreadable—before returning to helm.
For the next hour, the storm owns us.
Men curse the sky. Water steals barrels. The mast creaks like dying beast. Kaine orders me to bail water from lower deck; I haul buckets until arms go numb.
Fear becomes a constant companion—sharp, buzzing, alive under skin.
But something else forms with it.
A thread of defiance.
Storms try to break me. Alaric mocks me. The crew laughs when I slip.
But I do not fall again.
Near dusk, the storm finally exhales. Winds lessen. Waves soften. Clouds drift apart like torn curtains. Pale sun returns—weak, but welcome.
The deck is chaos—broken crates, torn rope ends, bruised men breathing like beasts who won. Yet laughter erupts among them—wild, victorious laughter.
“We live!” Kaine shouts.
“Barely,” Riva adds, hanging from mast like damp cat.
Niall slaps Bram’s back hard enough to leave mark. “We’ll call that a morning stretch.”
Pirates laugh in the face of death. I gape, soaked, shaking.
Then Alaric walks toward me.
His shirt clings to carved muscle beneath scars. Rain beads on jaw. A cut bleeds lightly across forearm. He wipes water from eyes using back of hand, smile easy as if we survived nothing more than a light drizzle.
“First storm,” he says. “And you didn’t die. Impressive.”
“I almost did,” I whisper.
“You’ll almost die a hundred more times,” he replies casually. “Welcome to sea.”
Crew bursts into laughter at my horrified expression. Alaric joins them—head thrown back, eyes bright. A moment ago his hands held me like lifeline. Now I’m a joke again.
The shift burns.
I glare. “I saved that rope knot.”
He lifts brow. “You saved one knot. Storm had fifty.”
“Say thank you.”
He smirks. “Thank you for not dying. Would’ve been tedious to replace you.”
I want to punch him—or cry. Maybe both.
“Next storm you hold the sail alone,” Riva calls.
I almost faint.
Alaric leans close, voice low, only for me. “Fear is good. Means you want to live. Keep wanting.”
Our eyes lock—too close, too intense—before he steps back, mask returning. Smirk. Arrogance. Carefree king of chaos.
The brief moment of something real dissolves like foam.
Crew goes back to repairs. Alaric helps Kaine lift broken barrel, laughing like a man with no ghosts. No guilt. No nightmare memories of drowned ships.
But I saw his eyes when he saved me.
Lightning behind them. Not fear—focus. Something primal. Protective.
Maybe accidental.
Maybe not.
I touch bruised ribs and whisper to waves, “I will survive this world. Even if it kills me first.”
Ocean answers with a soft, threatening hush.