The Ruin of Tides

The rope burned through your palms as you hauled the last crate from the wreckage of your father's boat. Salt-crusted wood groaned against the pier, and behind you, your sister Mara counted the salvaged coils with a tightness in her jaw that said the numbers weren't enough. The storm had taken everything—the fleet, the trade routes, the future your family had built over three generations. What remained was this: a few meters of rope, a broken compass, and the hollow look in your mother's eyes as she watched from the shack's doorway.

You didn't hear Corvin approach until his shadow fell across the crate. He stood at the edge of the pier, polished boots on warped planks, a ledger tucked under one arm. He smelled of whiskey and expensive soap.

"Master diver," he said, with the mild condescension of a man who'd never held a breath underwater. "I have a proposition. The kind that saves families."

Your knuckles went white on the rope. The tide pulled at the pilings below, and somewhere in the deep, something waited.