Stump coughed himself awake.

  He rolled to his side and hurled seawater onto the beach. When there was nothing left to spit up, he wiped the saliva from his lips and gazed at the dwarf beside him.

  "Y'alright?" said Morg. He sat slumped in the sand, his clothes sopping.

  "I think so," rasped Stump. He struggled to a sitting position and wrung the sea from his scarf and cloak. His chest burned. "The Ocelots?"

  Morg shook his head.

  Stump's ears fell. "Our boat?"

  "Gone," the dwarf muttered, staring longingly out to sea.

  Stump imagined, if the mask were absent, he would see tears welling in his friend's eyes. "It's alright," he said, laying a tiny hand on Morg's arm. The fabric squelched at his touch. "Maybe it'll come back as a ghost boat. I saw those sails Germott talked about, right before we went overboard."

  "Don't matter," said Morg. "Unless we build a raft out o' trees 'n seashells we're stuck on this spit."

  Stump ensured the pouches were still affixed to his side and searched around for the satchel, but it hadn't washed to shore with them. "Tits," he breathed.

  "Tits," said Morg. "I could've been sat on a stool at the Knight Inn, sippin' on a pint of Amber. Instead I've got meself tangled in the doings of another company. Again." He kicked at the sand. "Reem was right. It's the damned death o' me."

  "Don't say that. We're still here, aren't we?"

  "Ye make our fate sound like a blessing."

  "Well…"

  "It's a curse, what it is. Didn't ye hear me? This spit's our grave."

  Curse. The bloodlust was a curse. The Mark of Grumul was a curse, even if its branding held no power. But they were alive, washed ashore. On a haunted island, sure, but that prospect was already brighter than their averted fate of spending eternity with the seaweed-fingered ghosts of the seafloor.

  Stump jumped to his feet, swept his damp cloak behind him, and turned to face the island. There was little to survey in front of the foggy veil. "You never know what we might find," he said, hopeful. He held his hand out to Morg. "I can't do it alone, though."

  The dwarf eyed it through his dripping mask. With a tired groan he reached for it, and Stump nearly toppled over helping his friend to stand.

  "Germott was right, by the way," Stump said as they left the water's edge.

  "Who?"

  "The human from the Ocelots. Lumenurgy makes it so ghosts pass right through you."

  Morg mumbled a half-hearted acknowledgment hedged by a much longer series of curses. Stump didn't push the matter further.

  "Can your skill sense anything nearby?" he said as they ambled inland. Patches of seagrass swayed under a salty breeze. A wheel missing half its spokes was partially buried in mud next to the shattered remains of a wagon.

  "It don't work on land," said Morg. "Got to be on a boat for anythin' useful. I can tell ye we're walkin' northwest though, for what good it does."

  "So do you have virtue? And focus points, and trees of abilities?

  "Aye, it works the same as yers. Lumensa's my deity, too. Goddess o' sailors 'n navigation."

  "And your class?"

  "Swashbuckler. It's what ye get for pairin' Sailing with some martial skills. Unarmed Combat, Expert One-Handed 'n Sailing's my three active skills."

  A building emerged from the fog, hollowed by time and surrounded by ashen white trees. Their roots wrapped around its cracked foundation. Seagrass bent through a shattered doorway.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  A coin glistened on the ground. Stump fished it from the dirt and rubbed it clean with his scarf. He recognized the five inward facing profiles minted on its face, and the double towers on the other side.

  "I found something," he said. "Copper."

  Morg hovered over his shoulder. "That's silver."

  Stump studied the disc in his hands. Beneath its luminous white glow was the amber sheen of the other copper pieces he'd collected. "You sure?"

  The dwarf grabbed the coin and brought it to the eye holes in his mask. "Silver. I mean it's made of copper, but it passes for silver in Aubany. It's got them Amber Bastion towers and the faces o' the platinum companies on it. And it's got that white glow imbued by the Lumenurgists. Copper glows orange. Silver's white."

  "But why call it silver if it's made of copper?"

  "Most o' the silver mines are owned by Borovic up north. Nevae's got much o' the gold. Aubany's overflowin' with copper, though, so it's what makes for coinage. The roads 'tween cities are dangerous enough with creatures from other worlds that if yer thinkin' about pursuing a life as a merchant, ye better have some Martial skills to go with it. So we don't get much from ‘em in the way o’ trade.”

  Stump nodded along, surprised at how simple he found the concept. Coins were gifted to the matrons of his tribe, but they held no value other than the desire of whichever old crone you were offering them to.

  "The glow means it's new, doesn't it?" he said. "Which means it might've found its way here recently."

  "Aye," the dwarf said, then casually pocketed the coin.

  Stump narrowed his eyes. "Morg…"

  The dwarf raised his hands defensively. "I'm just holdin' onto it," he said. "We can discuss what ye want to do with it when our lives are secured."

  They scoured for more signs—glimmer, badges, equipment, anything glistening with youth, at least compared to the ancient wreckage of the isles. But everything they came across had been rotting for generations, and the ground was too hardened to accept footprints.

  There was nothing beyond the ruined building to indicate their next heading, so Morg picked a direction he grumbled at the least, and stalked off. Stump followed behind, and soon they had wandered back into the belly of fog.

  A wind picked up and buffeted Stump's cloak. He pulled it around his chest and shivered.

  "Stump," said Morg, coming to a stop.

  "Yes?" Stump looked up at the dwarf, then followed where he was pointing.

  The wind peeled the mist away, and spearing out of the edge of the spit was a lighthouse.

  The old stone wheeled into view as they neared its base.

  A damp sea wind rolled off the water, cutting through the jagged rocks behind the lighthouse and creaking an old iron lantern barely clinging to a pole above the doorway. Stump craned his neck to follow it from foundation to cupola. The paint that once adorned the old tower had long since chipped away, leaving nothing but fitted stone glazed with brine and sparkling silver moss.

  And at the top, a face peered back at Stump.

  "Morg…" He reached out to tug on the swaddled dwarf, but found no one standing beside him. He jumped at the sound of splintering wood.

  "Y'say somethin'?" said Morg, from the open lighthouse threshold, the door creaking on its shattered hinges.

  Above the face had vanished—a tactic that seemed to be a favourite of the ghosts of Seabrace. Stump gave himself a moment to shiver in the evening chill before he reluctantly followed the dwarf inside.

  A salty breeze funnelled through the opening and whistled up the lighthouse steps, which hugged the wall and circled up ten feet to a second floor.

  "Dark up here," warned Morg from halfway up the steps.

  Stump's goblin eyes quickly chased away the shadows of the second floor. It was a cluttered mess of books, fishing equipment, and old trinkets from the sea. A ladder along a wall climbed high up to the beacon, where a closed hatch separated their two floors.

  The hatch creaked. Pockets of dust descended from their hideaways.

  Stump gulped. "Something's up there."

  "Sharp mind ye got," said Morg.

  "Ghosts again, you think?"

  "I'd wager," he said grimly, and then added, "Careful, that tickles."

  Stump, who was standing several feet away, gave him an odd look. "I'm over here."

  A shriek cut the air. Books scattered from their places, torn pages burst from leather spines, and seashells clattered to the floor. Stump pressed his ears shut and fell to his knees. Morg slammed into the wall with a grunt.

  He swiped out with his dagger, hitting nothing. A second round of exploding pages erupted behind him and threw him over a desk. Stump scuttled from the chaos, trying to spot the attacker through the whirling parchment.

  He threw his hand in the air and channelled the virtue through his body and to his fingertips.

  The room exploded with light. Morg staggered back, cursing, and in front of him a swirling mist of grey and green coalesced into humanoid shape. It stood there, bracing against the light. He was translucent and dressed in the regalia of another time, the edges of his figure blending in with the mist surrounding him.

  "I see him!" Stump pointed to the ghost.

  Morg roared and lunged. The spirit collapsed into mist, breezing over the dwarf's shoulders and reforming behind him.

  "Sir Halwyn!" came a voice from above.

  The hatch at the top of the ladder had swung open, and peering from beneath the cupola was a young lady. Short brown hair framed a slender human face. "Sir Halwyn, are you alright?"

  The ghost glanced up at her with a measure of confusion. "Interlopers!" he wailed. Even his voice was wispy, not fully material. "Agents of Jaessun!"

  "No," the girl said, then sized up their visitors. "Who sent you?"

  Stump straightened and brushed off the pages settled on his back. "Wasptongue," he said.

  She relaxed her shoulders with a desperate sigh. "Thank the Bright Queen," she whispered. "I'm Denna. Denna of the Iron Fleece."