Port Vraine swallowed all sound, leaving only the pull of the tide and the promise of concealment. The brine-thick air clung to the sweat on Serenya’s skin, the impressions of cuffs still fresh on her wrists and neck. No longer bound, she slipped into the shadows of the damp dock, a phantom among the crates and ropes. A steady river of light bobbed from ship to ship, casting a line of light among their hulls like restless ghosts.

  She didn’t have far to go before she found her mark.

  The Skylash was close at its berth, its hull smooth as a razor shell, its masts standing tight and ready. A skeleton crew remained aboard; their occasional voices lost to the hush of the sea. This was her moment.

  No music stirred. No shanties, no idle humming. There never had been.

  Zhaelyrra was a world without song.

  The wind howled, the waves roared, but no voices danced with them. No strings shivered with the tide’s breath; no drums struck the bones of ships in rhythm. The sea had stolen the songs—dragged them down into its cold, sunless depths. Forgotten. Like a half-remembered dream slipping through waking fingers.

  But if the whispers were true—if the Skylash truly carried what they said—Serenya would take it. Even if she had to drown the world to hear it sing again.

  She pressed against a stack of cargo, inspecting the officer of the watch pace the deck. The Aeluthera. A name swallowed by silence, buried as a relic of a lost age. If she had any sense, she’d turn back, leave it to whatever fate awaited it. But sense had never been her gift. Only hunger. Deep, restless hunger for something beyond this soundless, empty world.

  She breathed in, then moved as she exhaled through her mouth, composed and unhurried. Her footsteps light, body a shadow among shadows. The cargo hold was open—as expected. Many hands had touched this shipment, and there was always a weakness, be it carelessness or by design. It had taken months of listening, buying secrets with coin, favors, and even a few arrests to learn of the Aeluthera’s resting place: one chest, bound in iron, buried beneath a shipment of fine silks. Too important to display. Too dangerous to lock away in anything but secrecy.

  Serenya glided past the lethargic deckhands and inebriated officers, her movements a silent, graceful dance. A loose hatch near the stern provided her entry, leading her into the ship's cavernous belly. The scent of salt and damp wood soon gave way to the mustiness of rusting metal and the lingering aroma of the earlier stew. Swiftly weaving through the stacks of cargo—barrels of dried meat, sacks of grain, bolts of silk destined for foreign shores—she reached the back, where a tattered canvas concealed her target.

  A crate unlike the others. Iron-bound, its wood dark as a storm-heavy sky. Markings she did not recognize carved deep into its lid.

  A brief sense of unease touched her spine.

  She reached out and her fingertips brushed the steely latch. The wood beneath was dry, warm. A thin sound reached her—not a sound, not truly. A sensation. An understanding. The stories were true.

  She wrenched the lid open. Inside, a black box. The same unfamiliar markings, this time painted in a striking violet, stared back at her.

  Then—footsteps. Too close.

  Serenya flattened against the cargo, slipping into the dark just as a figure entered the broken light.

  It wasn’t a waverider. Nor a night watchman.

  The woman stood, wrists bound in heavy iron shackles, but her presence filled the space like a storm would over the ocean just as it was about to break. Her eyes captured the light, their brilliance was as whetted as shattered glass. The color the same too. And when she spoke, her voice was an undercurrent of power, like a command that seemed to ripple through the very air around her.

  "Free me."

  The words pressed against Serenya's mind, an inescapable pull, cold as the rising tide before morning. But the words slid off her like water on oil. She felt the force of their power, but it had no hold over her. Had she been weaker, perhaps the words would have consumed her. But she was Serenya, and no one commanded her.

  She stepped forward and smirked. "No."

  The woman’s stone-colored eyes shifted with disbelief. "That’s… that’s not possible.” She spoke with command once more. “Obey."

  Serenya crossed her arms tightly over her chest, her finger tapping an impatient sequence against the bulk of her bicep. Her brow furrowed, a subtle crease shaping between her eyes as she viewed the woman with a particularly unimpressed expression.

  "How many more times must we go through this tiresome gambit? I have far more pressing matters that demand my attention."

  The woman, draped in white, was bound and burdened, every feature marked by suffering. Her sleeveless form stood in stark contrast to Serenya, who was clad in black from neck to toe, untamed and free. Serenya circled the woman like a predator, assessing her and the situation—a locked door and the key that refused to fit.

  "Well?" Serenya prompted.

  The woman’s cold calmness cracked. "You must. There’s a place I need to be and little time to be there. Free me."

  "No, siren, the tide’s against it."

  "I am no Siren!"

  Serenya raised a brow. "Didn’t you just try to command me? I know a singer when I feel one."

  The woman’s fury simmered beneath her skin. "What do you even know? You are Unblessed. An Air-thief. You will never know the embrace of the tides."

  "You talk like you were born in the Cursed Age," Serenya scoffed. "And yet, you claim you’re no Siren. Make up your mind."

  The woman rolled her shoulders back, squaring off Serenya as she lifted her chin. Her eyes narrowed, the piercing grey irises hardening to flint. A muscle twitched in her jaw, the only outward sign of the storm brewing behind her composed facade. "I could call for them. They’ll come."

  Serenya chuckled. "For someone in chains, you aren’t convincing me to help you. Besides,” She turned and began to walk away. “They probably left a deaf man to watch you."

  The woman fell silent. Then she noticed the black box Serenya was reaching for. A smirk flashed, then vanished. "Do you even know what you are after?"

  Serenya picked up the box, testing its weight. "I know what I need to know."

  "Then you know it’s not meant for you. You, Air-thief, cannot wield it. You will bring yourself and this world to ruin."

  Serenya’s lips curled. "Sounds fun."

  She strode toward the stairs that carried her down. The woman called after her. "So you know the way to Syrin?"

  Serenya paused, glancing back with a knowing smile. "Ah, so you do have value."

  She set the box down and perched on a nearby crate. "Tell me, not-Siren, why would you tell me?"

  The woman hesitated, then sat, chains banging. "The journey there is perilous. The seas will claim you. Only the blessing of Thalissa can keep you from drowning... But my freedom would also spare you. I alone carry the song to get you there."

  Serenya’s gaze dropped to the box, then lifted to the woman. "A finslave at best. Hardly a true tamer you are." She tapped her pointer finger against her temple a few times.

  The woman smiled. "You will not be welcomed among my captures."

  Serenya grinned. "I wouldn’t want to be."

  Heavy footfalls on the steps behind them end the conversation.

  Serenya vanished into the shadows. A tall man stepped into the hold. Cai Dravenholm. A harbormaster, she could tell by the wrist-cut sleeve on his left arm. A man of the sea, but still beholden to authority. He swept the room, then locked onto the woman.

  The box was gone.

  Serenya watched from the dark, heart steady, breath even.

  Cai settled on the woman, his expression hardening. "I’ve been instructed to bind you." He reached into his coat, pulling free a strip of coarse sailcloth. "But before that, we need to have a little chat."

  He approached with the gauged steps of a man who carried both certainty and hesitation. He analyzed the woman in white bound before him, his expression an impassive mask, but his fingers tightened around the strip of sailcloth in his grip.

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  "You don’t look like much," he said at last. "Not what I expected."

  The woman in white lifted her chin, her grey eyes catching the dim lantern light, reflecting it like steel.

  "And what did you expect?"

  Cai frowned. He had only rumors to go by, foolish tales of what she could do—some say she sang songs that had no place in this world. But he had not seen it. No one had. She had been taken quietly, without spectacle. No wailing. No hymns. Just a prisoner bound and sent to be delivered.

  "Nothing," he admitted. "I expected nothing."

  A grin almost crept at the corner of her lips. "Then you are already wiser than most."

  Cai shifted his weight, projecting a level of control over the woman. "I know why you’re here. Why you were taken. But if you’re thinking of escape, put that thought to rest. Heldrall is waiting. And we will reach it with you intact."

  The woman’s grin vanished. "I don’t respond well to orders."

  "Well good thing it wasn’t one. That was a warning. Try it, if you want."

  Cai didn’t leave room for doubt. Something about the way he moved made her believe him.

  She examined him, head tilting slightly. "You don’t want that."

  His jaw tightened. "No. I don’t."

  They stared at each other, the sounds of the ship—wood creaking, distant footsteps above—filling the space where words might have been. Cai took a step closer, lowering his voice.

  "I don’t know what you are, not truly. But I do know one thing—you shouldn’t go looking for it."

  Her expression remained guarded, but her fingers curled slightly against the bindings at her wrists. "And why not?"

  "Because whatever you think you’ll find there, it won’t be salvation. It won’t be freedom. It won’t be power." His grey eyes darkened, shadowed by something deeper than mere warning. "It will be the end of you."

  The woman in white considered his words, testing their worth. Then, finally, she leaned back against the wooden beam behind her, the iron of her shackles rattling as she moved.

  "Noted," she murmured. But the way she said it, the way her eyes moved past him—Cai knew she had not let go of the thought at all.

  He sighed and stepped back, lifting the cloth between his hands. "Hold still. I won’t tie it too tight."

  She let out a quiet chuckle, dry as old parchment. "How kind."

  "Huh, grey eyes," she mused. "Like the sea before a storm." The slight grin returned to her.

  Cai hesitated. Just a breath. Just a fraction of a moment. He said nothing as he bound her mouth, sealing her last words to him.

  He grabbed the woman’s chin tenderly and with practiced efficiency, he gagged her, tying the knot tight enough to dig into her cheeks. She let out a muffled sound, but her glare burned hotter than any words she might have spoken.

  Serenya leered from her hiding place. Good. That should keep her from causing trouble.

  The Skylash was no place to linger. Serenya slipped back the way she came, retracing her steps with the same skilled precision she used to get there. Only this time, her prize was in hand. Unfortunately for her, the ship was coming to life. More footsteps creaked the planks, voices of the crew returning from their night in the brothels and taverns filled the silence.

  Port Vraine was a city that never slept, especially not during this time of year. The warm, inviting waters made it a prime stop for merchants and smugglers alike, a place of shifting loyalties and fleeting pleasures. The bustling docks swarmed with a constant flow of travelers, workers, and those who profited from the chaos—cutpurses, dockhands, and whispers-for-hire. The air was always thick with the mingling scents of spiced rum and sizzling fish, carried on the salty breeze off the sea.

  Serenya kept to the darkness, slipping past a small group of waveriders laughing too loudly at their own jokes. The streets near the docks were lined with vendors peddling their goods beneath dim lanterns—shell jewelry, dried sea fruit, vials of oil said to ward off the depths. A group of dockhands bartered over a crate of imported spirits, their voices carrying over the rolling tide.

  She was almost clear. Almost free.

  Then—movement. Right in front of her.

  A waverider. Young, but sharp-eyed. His eyes honed in on her the instant she stepped into the open. "Oi—"

  Serenya moved.

  Her first strike caught him in the gut, doubling him over. Before he could recover, she drove an elbow into his temple. He staggered, but not fast enough—her third hit, a swift kick to the jaw, sent him sprawling.

  He was out cold before he hit the ground.

  Serenya rolled her shoulders and cracked a few bones in her neck. Still got it.

  Without another glance back, she melted back into the shadows. The docks stretched ahead, but Serenya’s path led not to open freedom—but back into chains.

  The Cinderfly, a sleek vessel with midnight-blue sails, lay at anchor on the far end of the pier. Its hull was marked with the bold insignia of the Azure Armada, the governing naval force that officially controlled these waters, enforcing trade laws and maintaining order. Unofficially, however, harbormasters like Thech bent the rules until they snapped, so long as the price was good.

  Serenya found Thech exactly where she expected—sprawled on the quarterdeck, idly rolling a coin across his knuckles. His coat, a shade too fine and blue for a man who claimed to live by the sea, hung open at the chest, and his boots rested atop a barrel as if he hadn't a care in the world. The wrist-cut sleeve of his jacket marked him as another harbormaster, a man with authority—but only as much as he could twist to his own advantage.

  The moment he spotted her, he grinned.

  "Back so soon?" he drawled, slipping the coin between his fingers. "Thought maybe you'd gone soft and run for the hills."

  Serenya scoffed. "Soft isn’t in my nature."

  "That so?" Thech pushed to his feet, stepping off of the ship to greet her. "Then let’s talk about my payment. You promised me a piece of the haul, and my patience is thin."

  Serenya crossed her arms. "And you’ll get it. Small, but enough to make you rich. More than rich."

  Thech had an even more relaxed expression on his face. "Rich is relative, love. I want exact numbers."

  Serenya released a puff of air through pursed lips. She reached into the black box and withdrew a sliver of something dark—darker than ink, darker than the waters at midnight sea. A shard of Aeluthera, no larger than a finger bone, yet it seemed to vibrate against her palm. Thech's eyes narrowed as he studied the puzzling fragment, his brow furrowed in confusion.

  "That’s it?" he asked, but his voice was hushed now.

  Serenya smirked. "This alone could fetch more marks than your ship is worth."

  Thech wet his lips, calculating its true worth. He reached out as if to take it, but Serenya pulled back.

  "Payment first."

  His smirk returned, though now it held an edge. "Cheeky. But fine. What's the price?"

  "Enough to secure my next stop. And a promise."

  Thech chuckled. "I don’t do promises."

  "You do if you want this." She tilted the shard in the dim light illuminating the strip of ship, letting its unnatural sheen glint like something half-alive. "No questions asked. No talk of what I’m doing. You sail, you drop me, and you forget you ever saw me."

  Thech studied her, then groaned. "You’re a damn headache, Serenya."

  "And you love it," she replied smoothly.

  Thech barked a laugh. "Fine. You get your voyage, and I get my piece. But—" He leaned in, voice low. "Your chains awaits."

  Serenya didn’t flinch. She’d expected this. No one left the docks ignored unless they looked exactly as they came.

  Thech grinned at her silence. "Good girl. I’ll make it quick."

  She let him shackle her wrists. Loose enough that she could move, tight enough that it looked real. He pulled her forward, slinging an arm around her shoulder like an old friend leading a drunken companion, brushing the top of the black box.

  They had just stepped off the pier when they heard the shout ring out.

  "All hands! Bring men! This waverider’s down!"

  A handful of tidemen and dockworkers turned, eyes darting between the unconscious waverider on the cobbles and the two of them being too close to the incident.

  "Shit," Thech muttered under his breath.

  Serenya smirked. "Time to go."

  The gangplank of the Cinderfly trembled under their hurried steps. Behind them, voices rose in alarm, the first shouts of suspicion expanding through the docks like wildfire.

  Thech didn’t wait for subtlety. As soon as their boots hit the deck, he barked an order.

  "Looooose the moooooorings! We're off!"

  His men, ever quick when trouble was at their heels, sprang into motion. Ropes were cut, the sails unfurled, and the Cinderfly drifted away from the dock just as a group of waveriders and dock guards rounded the bend.

  Serenya caught a glimpse of them—a half-dozen men armed with cutlasses and apprehension, one crouched beside the still-unconscious waverider she’d left behind. A grizzled tideman pointed toward the ship.

  "That one! Stop them!"

  A musket fired. The shot splintered the railing beside Serenya’s head.

  "Faster!" Thech roared.

  The crew hauled at the lines. The wind, as if sensing their urgency, filled the sails, and the ship heaved forward. By the time the dock guards reached the pier’s edge, the Cinderfly was too far to board. Another shot rang out, but it was lost to the dark waves.

  Thech let out a short, triumphant laugh. "Hells, that was close." He turned to Serenya, with a smirk oiled in amusement. "Now—where are we off to, love?"

  Serenya approached the starboard rail, her piercing eyes scanning the distant horizon. The inky expanse of the sea was far from vacant.

  “There.”

  A silhouette against the moonlit waves—the Skylash. It had left port only minutes before them, its sails taut against the wind, gliding toward deeper waters.

  Serenya lifted her chin. "Catch up to the Skylash."

  Thech stilled. "You're joking."

  "Do I look like I'm joking?"

  He snapped to the other ship, then back to her. "That's no merchant scow. You planning to rob her?"

  "I'm planning what I’m planning. Remember? No questions."

  Thech stared at her for a long moment. Then, ever the opportunist, he grabbed at his tear-ducts, pulling them to the center of his nose, while shaking his head. "Mad as a stormwind, you are." He turned toward the helm. "You heard her, lads! Full sail!"

  The Cinderfly surged forward, her bow cut through the waves.

  Serenya kept her eyes locked on the Skylash. That woman, the sleeveless one, the one in white, was still aboard, still bound. But not for long.

  The chase began the moment the Cinderfly caught the wind.

  Her hull, built for speed, cut through the waves in pursuit of the Skylash, the moonlight glinting off her taut sails. Thech barked orders from the helm, his crew moving in a well-rehearsed pattern. Ropes strained, the mast groaned, and the ship surged forward even more.

  Serenya stood at the bow, eyes locked on the dark silhouette ahead. The Skylash was fast—but so was the Cinderfly.

  For a time, they gained.

  The distance between them shrank, wave by wave. Thech grinned, wild and careless. "You might have picked the right ship for this madness, girl."

  Serenya didn’t respond, her eyes glancing between the shifting sails of the Skylash and the sea beneath them. The wind was steady, the current in their favor. Soon, they’ll be close enough to—

  A shift.

  The Skylash's sails adjusted with precision, catching a gust the Cinderfly couldn't reach.

  The difference was immediate.

  The larger ship leapt forward, suddenly pulling away. Serenya's stomach twisted. It wasn't just speed—it was control. The Skylash knew these waters, knew the wind, and knew exactly when to take their advantage.

  Thech swore under his breath as the distance grew again. He adjusted course, but the Skylash played them completely. The gap widened, the ship slipping beyond their reach.

  Minutes passed. Then more.

  Finally, Thech rubbed his eyes and smacked his hand against the wheel. "Damn it all. That one's got the blood of Thalissa in her veins."

  Serenya clenched her fists. The chase was lost. But the hunt wasn't over.

  She turned to Thech, her voice calm, certain. "Let them run. I know where they’re headed."

  Thech’s eyes narrowed. "Do you now?"

  She nodded, gazing at the horizon. "Heldrall. The Land of Judgment."

  Silence cleared the deck. The name carried weight, even among sailors hardened by the sea.

  Thech studied her, then let out a slow, humorless chuckle. "You really don’t do things by the half, do you?"

  Serenya’s lips rounded into a sharp smile. "Never."

  Thech sighed and turned back to his crew. "You heard her, boys! Set a course for Heldrall!"

  The Cinderfly veered eastward, chasing the ghost of a ship that had already vanished into the night.