POV: Beth
The sea stretches endless for three days, a map of shifting blue with no land in sight. Sun burns the deck by day, cold bites bone at night. My hands bleed from rope work, my shoulders ache from training, but I refuse to fall behind again. Every bruise is a promise.
I will survive this world.
Whether it wants me or not.
By dawn of the fourth day, land rises from fog like a giant’s spine—a massive island port much larger than the last. Smoke stacks from metal-forges stain sky black. Dozens of ships cluster like hungry sharks. Voices echo across water—merchants, pirates, thieves. The stench of tar, alcohol, sweat, and rotting fish thickens air.
Kaine whistles. “Redwater Port. The worst of all hells.”
Riva adds, “Meaning you’ll fit right in soon, Beth.”
I ignore her. I’ve learned that reacting feeds them like blood in the water.
Alaric stands at helm, gaze darkened to steel. He’s tense—different than during storms. More controlled, but heavier.
Kaine notices. “You smell him too?”
Alaric’s jaw flexes. “I smell rumors. Not him.”
“Him?” I ask.
Silence falls sharp.
Riva climbs down from mast slowly. “You don’t know of Silas, girl?”
Kaine scoffs. “Of course she doesn’t. She was sipping tea with nobles before we fished her from gallows.”
I stiffen. “Tell me then.”
Niall crosses arms, voice low. “Silas the Deep. The man who commands a beast beneath the waves—Kraken’s chosen.”
A chill rolls down my spine.
Monsters should stay in nightmares. Not breathe salt above water.
Bram spits over rail. “If his ship sails here, we turn our tails and flee. No fight, no pride—survival.”
I look to Alaric. “Is he… like you?”
Crew laughs too loud. Alaric does not.
His eyes fix on horizon. “No. We are nothing alike.”
There is something cracked in the way he says it—not hatred, but history that smells like blood.
“How do you know him?”
He doesn’t answer directly. He shifts, posture rigid.
“Once,” Alaric says finally, voice low like tide waiting to pull something under, “there were three kings of sea. I was one. Silas another. Third… is dust now.”
“And Silas still rules?”
“He does more than rule,” Kaine mutters. “He enslaves storms. Commands Kraken. Makes men kneel or drown.”
“And Alaric,” Riva adds, “is the king who vanished. The ocean remembers absence more than presence.”
The words slam something in my chest—sympathy or fear, I don’t dare name.
“So you left your throne,” I say quietly.
Alaric’s gaze cuts to me like blade. “I didn’t leave. I was dragged from it.”
Questions burn my tongue—who dragged him? Why did he disappear? How did he lose everything? But his expression warns me.
Not now.
Not yet.
We dock at Redwater under creaking cranes. Shouting erupts around us as traders haggle over stolen spices, weapons, silk, even people. Children in rags carry buckets. Men with missing fingers gamble loudly. A woman sells shark teeth necklaces still stained with blood.
I grip railing harder. My stomach knots.
Alaric senses my tension. “Keep close. Do not wander.”
“I’m not helpless,” I mutter.
Riva snorts. “You are walking prey until you learn otherwise.”
I nearly snap back, but stop myself. She’s ruthless, but she’s not wrong. Every step I take here is heavy with eyes watching for weakness.
As we push through crowd, conversations flutter around us like dying birds.
“Silas drowned a ship of forty men last week—”
“Kraken dragged whole hull down screaming—”
“White bone sails seen near Skull Reef—”
Every whisper sharpens Alaric’s shoulders. His hand stays on hilt of sword. I see it—not fear, but bracing for ghosts.
I ask him softly, “Do you think you will face him?”
He doesn’t look at me. “The sea does not let kings ignore each other.”
That should comfort no one.
He stops at a tavern built of shipwrecked timber. A rusted sign reads The Drowned Maid. Exactly as welcoming as the name implies.
Inside smells of rum, old blood, and damp rope. Patrons watch us like scavengers eyeing fresh carrion. Kaine mingles easily. Riva orders two bottles. Bram disappears toward arm-wrestling table.
I sit stiffly, back to wall, scanning exits like Alaric taught me.
He drinks without flinching, lost in thought. Something far behind his eyes stirs—memory he doesn’t speak of.
I break silence carefully. “Kraken. Is it real?”
He meets my gaze. Slowly.
“Yes.”
I swallow. “You’ve seen it?”
Lightning flashes across his expression—memory painful, powerful. “Once.”
“What happened?”
He sets cup down. “Ask me again when you have enough scars to understand the answer.”
I look at my rope-burned hands. Not enough.
Not yet.
He stands abruptly. “Eat. Rest. Tomorrow we gather intel.”
He leaves me at table, stepping into crowd like shadow swallowed by larger shadow.
For the first time since escape, I sit alone—truly alone—in a world that wants me dead. Whispers of Kraken echo inside skull like distant thunder.
Saltblood.
Sea bride.
Prophecy not yet spoken out loud.
I touch my wrist where pirate mark hides beneath glove—warm, faintly pulsing.
Something waits for me in deep water.
Not death.
Recognition.
And I fear that more.