I was supposed to die at sea.

  That's what I tell myself as I cling to a twisted plank that was once part of the *Meridian's* hull. The merchant vessel that had been my home for three years now lies scattered across the ocean floor, along with most of her crew.

  My lungs burn. My fingers, numb from cold and crusted with salt, dig splinters into my palms. The storm that took us has moved on, leaving behind a deceptively calm sea and a black sky smeared with stars.

  "Theron Reed," I say aloud, my voice rough. "You are Theron Reed, and you are not dead yet."

  The words taste like copper and salt. I've been repeating them between bouts of unconsciousness, afraid that if I stop, I'll forget who I am. As if my name is all I have left to lose.

  It's been two days. Maybe three. Time blurs when you're drifting, when the horizon never changes and the sun is just another thing trying to kill you.

  The *Meridian* hadn't even been carrying anything valuable. Just cotton, grain, and a few luxury spices from the southern islands bound for Westport. Nothing worth dying for. Nothing that explained why we'd been attacked in the middle of a storm.

  I close my eyes, remembering the sleek outline of the ship that had appeared from within the squall like a nightmare. Black hull. Blood-red sails that looked like open wounds against the storm clouds. No warning. No mercy.

  Not that I'd seen much. I'd been below deck when the first cannon hit, shattering our mainmast and sending me sprawling across spilled cargo. By the time I'd staggered onto the rain-slick deck, half our crew were already dead, and Captain Lowell was shouting for us to abandon ship.

  I never saw his face, the captain of the vessel that destroyed us. Just the silhouette of a figure at the bow, watching with unsettling stillness as the *Meridian* listed and men screamed.

  There were no survivors but me. Some made it to lifeboats, but the storm swallowed them. Others were cut down by cannon fire or pinned beneath falling rigging. I survived only because I was thrown clear when the powder magazine exploded, knocking me unconscious and launching me far enough away that I wasn't dragged down by the sinking hulk.

  I drift in and out of consciousness as the day passes. The sun blisters my skin. My lips crack and bleed. I've stopped looking for ships on the horizon. We were far from the main shipping lanes when we were attacked. The chances of another vessel finding me before dehydration or exposure claims me are as thin as air at the bottom of the sea.

  Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

  As night falls again, the water changes.

  I notice it first in how it moves against my makeshift raft—not with the natural rhythm of waves, but with something deliberate, almost curious. There's a subtle glow beneath the surface, a faint phosphorescence that pulses like a heartbeat.

  "Just dying," I mutter, blaming my fevered mind for conjuring illusions of salvation.

  Then I hear it. Not a voice, exactly. More like the memory of a voice, a whisper that seems to come from inside my own skull.

  *Child of the tide. Blood of the deep.*

  The water around me stirs, circling my feeble raft like a predator. I try to draw my legs up, irrationally terrified that something will reach up and claim me.

  *Your time isn't now.*

  The sea glows brighter. Panic jolts through me, a pure animal terror as something massive moves beneath me. My raft rocks violently. In my delirium, I imagine I see a woman's face in the water, her eyes the bottomless blue of the deep ocean, her hair moving like silver seaweed.

  *The heart is broken. The veil is thin. They are coming back.*

  "Who's there?" I rasp, my voice barely a whisper. "Who's coming back?"

  The sea doesn't answer, but it continues to glow, the light spreading outward like a beacon.

  It's then that I see it on the horizon—a ship with pitch-black hull and blood-red sails unfurled despite the lack of wind. The same ship that destroyed the *Meridian*. I should be terrified, but exhaustion has hollowed me out. Let them find me. Let them finish what they started.

  As the vessel draws closer, I realize the strange light in the water is leading it straight to me. The woman's face appears once more, just for an instant, her expression impossible to read.

  *Remember, child. You were chosen.*

  And then she's gone, leaving only darkness and the approaching ship. My vision tunnels, consciousness slipping away like water through fingers. The last thing I see before blackness claims me is a rope ladder unfurling over the side of the pirate ship, and a tall figure descending, silhouetted against the stars.

  I taste blood in my mouth, salt on my skin, and something else—something ancient that fills my nose and lungs like the breath before a storm.

  I know now that I was wrong.

  I wasn't supposed to die at sea.

  I was supposed to be claimed by it.