POV: Beth
The island looks bigger in daylight—less mythical, more cruel. Jagged black rocks just like broken teeth around its crescent shore. The forest beyond rises steep, tangled in brambles and ghost-gray trunks. No fruit. No cottages. No smoke. Nothing human.
Just wind and hunger waiting.
My stomach growls loud enough for birds to scatter from the cliffside. Alaric hears, of course. He always hears. He stands at the tideline, shirt ripped open, seawater drying on inked skin. He watches waves the way priests watch altars—like something sacred answers only him.
When he glances back, his expression holds smug disappointment. “You eat?”
I glare. “Do you see a meal wandering around waiting to be scooped up?”
He smirks, infuriatingly relaxed. “You could try catching one.”
“With what hands? These are not fishing claws.”
He bites into a shellfish he cracked open with a rock moments ago. Juice drips down his wrist. He looks like hunger never touched him once in life, while mine gnaws ribs like wolves.
He gestures to a pile of stones and driftwood. “Fire. Start one.”
“I don’t know—”
“Learn.”
He leaves me there, as if I’m assignment and not person, and stalks off toward higher rock to scout whatever pirates scout for—escape routes, navy sails, or a new opportunity to mock me.
I stare at the stones and wood like they’re puzzle with missing pieces. Rain spatters lightly, cold and persistent. My fingers shake as I arrange sticks the way I’ve seen servants do at feasts. I strike stones. Sparks appear—tiny, bright, mocking.
Wind kills every one.
I try again. Again. My nails break. Fingers blister. Breath panting. My wedding fantasies feel like stories told to a child too stupid to know better.
I slam stones together too hard. They slip. One cuts my palm. I hiss, blood mixing with rain. My eyes blur. I refuse to cry again. I promised myself after the church—no more tears for nobles who spit on my name.
But tears come anyway.
A shadow falls over me. Alaric has returned—just in time to witness failure.
He looks down at the pathetic nest of wet wood. “Ah,” he says lightly. “The fire-making prodigy returns.”
I wipe my cheeks with the back of my shaking hand. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” He crouches, picking up one of my stones. “Expect a princess to know how to survive longer than a silk ribbon in wind?”
“I am not a princess.” My voice cracks.
He rolls the stone in his palm like coin. “Pirate-blood then.”
“I said stop.”
“You wear the mark.” His gaze slips to my wrist, that cursed brand I hid my whole life. “Blood doesn’t lie.”
“I am not pirate-blood!” I shout, louder than storm spray. “My father is Governor Rowan.”
“Your guardian is Governor Rowan.” He strikes stone against iron of his broken chains—one spark catches on the single dry thread in the pile, a small flame blossoming like an insult. “Your blood belongs to the sea.”
Anger slams me like wave. “You know nothing about me.”
“I know you rowed into a storm instead of sitting to die.” His tone turns sharp, cutting. “I know you opened a lock instead of waiting for prince to change his mind. I know you keep breathing when you want to sink. Sounds pirate enough.”
The flame smothers under new wave of drizzle. Damp smokes rises, bitter.
I stare, throat tight. “You think pirates are brave? They murder, steal, drown innocents.”
He laughs—a cruel, amused bark. “And nobles don’t? Your prince threw you like spoiled meat. Guard dogs dragged your father. Tell me again who murders and who smiles while doing it.”
The words dig deep. I hate that he isn’t wrong.
I try to spark fire again. My hands fumble. Alaric watches with casual cruelty, biting another mussel he gathered effortlessly.
“Hold the stone like you mean to break something,” he says. “Not like you’re afraid it’ll break you.”
“I’m not afraid.”
“You’re shaking.”
“It’s cold.”
“And you’re lying.” He stands, stretches, bones cracking. “Fetch water. If storm gift left any. You’ll need it when you fail at fire again.”
I rise unsteadily. Legs ache. I follow shoreline where tide pools glitter like tiny mirrors. Crabs scuttle. A gull circles overhead, shrieking. I find a hollow in rock where fresh rainwater collected. I lower myself to fill a shell.
My reflection wavers—salt-stiff hair, bruised eyes, gown ragged as beggar’s cloth. I barely recognize girl reflected.
A bride yesterday, a fugitive wreck today.
I return with shell. Alaric has arranged wood into teepee shape—dry pieces scavenged from deeper inland, not the soaked ones I used. He builds things with brutal efficiency, like he’s done it on battlefield with rain and blood dripping around him.
“You went for better wood?”
“You were busy becoming storm-victim artwork,” he says.
I want to throw the shell at his head.
He kneels, tearing moss into tinder. Muscles flex under skin marked with swirling tattoos—sea serpents twisting around ribs, compass etched on shoulder, a rising kraken curling near spine. I hate looking and yet I look.
He cups flame when sparks land. It smokes, then ignites into small fire. Heat sighs outward. My numb fingers twitch toward it.
“See?” he says. “Not difficult. When you stop being gentle with world.”
“I hate you,” I whisper.
He grins. “Good. Hate burns hotter than wet wood.”
We eat later—if chewing raw clams until jaw aches counts. My stomach twists but hunger wins. Alaric eats like wolf, silent and sharp-eyed, watching sea as if expecting ghost fleet to rise.
He tosses empty shells aside. “You asked how long before prince hunts you.”
I swallow hard. “Yes.”
He points toward distant water. On other side of island, smoke curls faint beyond horizon, ships. My blood freezes.
“They’re looking already,” he says. “Posters across ports by sunrise, I wager. Your face on tavern boards, coin offered for girl with pirate mark. Your prince wants you erased, not reclaimed.”
My throat closes.
“I can still go back,” I whisper, weak even to my ears. “Explain it was mistake, beg for forgiveness—”
Alaric laughs, full and cruel. “Beg? You think the crown forgives pirate blood? They’d lace your throat with rope before the sentence finished.”
“I can’t be pirate-blood.” My voice breaks. “I won’t.”
He leans back, eyes dark as deepwater. “You can deny the tide. But the tide comes anyway.”
“I am not a pirate-blood!”
Wind howls agreement or mockery—I cannot tell.
“I am Beth Rowan,” I say, trembling. “Daughter of Governor Rowan. Raised to read, to sew, to serve court someday. I’m not one of you. I never wanted this.”
Alaric tilts head. “What did you want?”
“A home.” Tears sting again. “A garden. A husband who might learn to love me. Music. Safety. I wanted to belong somewhere.”
“Fairy tales,” he says softly, almost bored. “The sea tears those first.”
“You take pleasure in this.”
“I take pleasure in truth.” His gaze holds mine. “And truth is simple. You cannot return. You’ll starve alone. You’ll drown at sea. You’ll die begging prince who threw you like plague. Or—” He gestures to fire, to ocean, to mark on my wrist. “You learn what blood remembers.”
The hatred between us thickens like smoke. I want to scream. To hit him. To run until land ends.
Instead I sit beside reluctant fire, shivering as smoke clings to hair. Hunger dulls anger only slightly. He yawns, stretched beside flame like it belongs to him.
“I will never be like you,” I whisper.
He closes his eyes. “Give it time.”
Wind sings across rock. Fire pops. My future dissolves like ash. The world took everything I knew in a single day.
Now all I have is a pirate king I loathe, an island hungry for weakness, and a brand on my wrist that feels like fate tightening.
But somewhere beneath rage and fear, a small flame sparks—If I must survive, I will.
Even if survival requires teeth.