POV: Beth
Rain turned the city into a dripping iron jaw that wanted to chew me alive. Every alley glistened black, slick with mud and spilled rum, soldiers’ boots smashing puddles as they searched. I ran harder, lungs burning, cloak whipping behind me like a torn flag. I could still smell them—gunpowder, leather, authority. They were close.
Too close.
I had said goodbye to the rogue women only hours earlier. They were rough, loud, terrifying—but they had taught me something important: I could survive without Alaric, without comfort, without anyone. I hugged the corner of a house, listening to Navy voices echo.
“She’s near. Governor’s bastard girl—reward stands.”
Bastard. Pirate-spawn. Saltblood.
I swallowed the sting and kept moving.
The docks opened ahead—wooden boards glistening, lanterns rocking in the storm wind. Waves slammed violently. A ship’s bell screamed through thunder like a warning. One wrong step meant death. I ran anyway. Better drown than be dragged back to that dungeon. Better drown than watch Rowan die without fighting.
Boots thundered behind me—closer, louder.
“STOP!”
No.
I sprinted, slipping on wet plank. My foot missed—the world tilted. Cold water swallowed me whole.
Salt filled my mouth like knives. Waves pulled me under, dragging me deeper, choking me. My lungs screamed. The storm turned the sea into a living beast, dragging me by the ankles as though it wanted to drag me into a grave.
I kicked, fought, clawed upward. Nothing. Darkness thickened. My limbs slowed.
I’m going to die.
Rowan’s voice flickered like a candle. My little Beth… be safe…
No. I refused. I had not come this far to give Adrian satisfaction. I had not bled, starved, killed just to end here—nameless under black waves.
Help— I begged without sound. Not to gods. Not to men.
To the sea.
The world shifted.
Something awakened.
It started inside my chest—a burn spreading through my ribs like lightning wanting to escape. Water curled around me differently, no longer cold death but coiling like fingers around my waist, lifting.
My eyes snapped open—and I saw it.
The water moved at my command.
A column surged upward, hurling me toward the surface like a blade through darkness. I gasped, coughing, hair plastered to my face. Lightning cracked the sky, illuminating everything—the waves formed a path, a rising ridge like a serpent under my feet.
I stood. On water.
Shaking. Terrified. Alive.
The ocean didn’t drown me. It answered me.
Power thrummed through my veins like a second heartbeat. A deep ancient whisper echoed—
saltborn.
The path collapsed just as I scrambled onto a floating crate, the ocean dropping me gently instead of swallowing. Sand scraped my palms. My body trembled uncontrollably as I crawled onto shore like something reborn through violence.
Rain slapped my skin. Soldiers searched upstream—they hadn’t seen. My breath hitched. Hysterical laughter bubbled up.
“I’m alive,” I whispered, half sob, half wonder. “I shouldn’t be. But I am.”
My fingers shook as I looked toward the black horizon. Somewhere out there was Alaric—maybe drunk, maybe laughing, maybe not thinking about me at all. Somewhere out there was Silas with his Kraken like a leash. Somewhere Rowan sat in chains awaiting death.
Salt water dripped from my wrist and glowed faintly along the pirate mark—only for a moment, but enough.
My blood wasn’t meant for land.
The sea wanted me back.
And I would answer.
Tonight, I didn’t just survive.
I rose.