The Docks of Harbor's End
Dawn clawed its way over the rotting piers of Harbor's End, painting the sky in greasy hues of orange and gray. The air reeked of salt, dead fish, and the acrid tang of smuggled essence cores leaking from rusted crates. War Spawn rats—twisted creatures with glowing green eyes and jagged teeth—scuttled through puddles of black sludge, their claws clicking against the warped wood.
Fifteen-year-old Kael Vorn crouched behind a barrel of rancid whale oil, his light blue eyes narrowed against the glare of the rising sun. His curly brown hair, bright as sun-bleached driftwood, stuck to his neck with sweat. The tattered sleeves of his tunic flapped in the salty breeze, revealing wiry arms crisscrossed with faded scars. One arm was wrapped in frayed cloth, hiding a fresh burn from a Tideknight's gauntlet.
Two guards. One crate.
He'd spent weeks tracking the shipment—a Beast-core from a deep-sea shark, pulsating with enough raw essence to pay off his father's debts ten times over. Fail, and the brewer's thugs would break Garrick's remaining arm.
Kael scooped up a rotting squid from a nearby bucket, its tentacles slimy and reeking. With a flick of his wrist, he lobbed it at the nearest Tideknight.
Splat.
The squid exploded against the man's polished helmet, spraying ink across his face.
"Oi, pretty eyes!" Kael barked, already sprinting toward the cargo hold. "Catch!"
The Tideknight roared, swiping blindly with his mace. Kael ducked, the weapon whistling over his head as he slid beneath the dock's splintered railing. The Beast-core crate loomed ahead, chained shut and stamped with Lord Marrow's crest—a serpent coiled around a hammer.
Pick the lock. Grab the core. Run.
He jammed a rusted nail into the keyhole, hands trembling. The Tideknight's boots thundered closer.
"Come on, come on—"
The lock snapped. Kael flung the crate open. Inside, the Beast-core glowed like bottled lightning, its blue light casting jagged shadows across his face. He pocketed it, but a guttural hiss froze his blood.
A War Spawn rat—twice the size of a hound, its fur matted with Dead Zone sludge—lunged from the shadows.
Kael grabbed a fishhook from his belt and stabbed upward. The creature's jaws snapped inches from his throat, rancid breath hot on his face. The hook pierced its eye, and it screeched, thrashing wildly.
"Die, you ugly—"
He slammed the rat's head against the crate, once, twice, until it went limp. The cargo door began to creak shut, hydraulic gears grinding. Kael jammed the rat's corpse into the mechanism, teeth bared.
Crunch.
The door shuddered, stuck. He wriggled free just as a mace cratered the dock where he'd stood.
"You're dead, gutter rat!" the Tideknight spat.
Kael scrambled up a frayed net dangling from a derelict ship, his lungs burning. Below, the second guard raised a crossbow.
Thwip.
The bolt grazed his ear. He leapt onto the ship's rotting deck, splinters digging into his palms.
The Bone Market sprawled ahead—a claustrophobic maze of stalls hawking monster bones, tainted essence, and Tideweave scraps. Kael wove through the chaos, overturning baskets of eel spines and ducking under sagging tarps.
"Stop him!" the Tideknight bellowed.
A merchant swung a whalebone club. Kael grabbed a cracked mirror from a stall, angling sunlight into the man's eyes.
Blind. Strike. Move.
He kicked the stumbling man into a rack of dried seagull talons, then hurled the mirror at a lantern. Flames engulfed a stall's tarpaulin, smoke billowing.
"Rats survive," Kael muttered, vaulting over a cart of rotting kelp. "You're just dinner."
Veyra Tideborn
The air shifted—a sudden chill, like the breath before a storm.
The harbor waters parted, curling away from the docks as if repelled. A woman stood atop the waves, her silhouette backlit by the rising sun.
She stepped onto the dock, the planks frosting under her boots. Her flawless olive skin and storm-gray eyes radiated an unnatural calm, her dark hair braided with shark teeth. Her right arm, carved of black stone streaked with glowing blue veins, dripped essence onto the wood.
"Enough," she said.
The Tideknights' armor crumpled inward, pinning them to the ground like beetles. They gagged, seawater frothing from their lips.
Kael froze, the Beast-core burning a hole in his pocket.
Veyra tilted her head, studying him. "You fight like a cornered eel. Useful… for bait."
He forced a smirk. "Thanks. Now leave before I poke your other arm."
She flicked her wrist. The rusted dagger at Kael's belt flew into her stone hand. "Strike me," she said, tossing it back. "If you land a hit, I'll forget I saw you."
Kael lunged, feinting left before slashing at her stone arm—the only flaw he could see.
Snap.
She caught the blade between two fingers, shattering it. "Predictable. But you're faster than the dregs here."
A purse heavy with silver coins landed at his feet. "Steal for Marrow again," she said, turning away, "and I'll drown you myself."
The shack leaned drunkenly over the harbor, its walls stained with blood from the butcher's shop below. Kael tossed the coins onto a warped table where his father, Garrick Vorn, sat slumped over a bottle of oyster liquor.
The man's once-broad shoulders were hunched, his beard streaked with gray. A ragged stump—where his right arm had been—twitched as he glared.
"Where'd you get this?" Garrick slurred.
"Fell off a noble's ship," Kael lied.
Garrick snorted. "You'll end up like your mother. Dead for someone else's war."
Kael's hand drifted to the rusted locket under his tunic—his mother's, emptied long ago. "I'll survive. No one's dying for me."
Outside, the tide hissed against the docks. A figure emerged from the mist—a Marine Cousin, her gill-slitted neck glistening. She pressed a shark tooth into Kael's palm.
"Watch for the girl who sings to storms," she whispered. "She'll drown you in hope."
Then she was gone, melting into the fog.
Kael stared at the tooth, his chest tight. Somewhere in the dark, Veyra Tideborn watched.
And the tide kept rising.