Zyren's hand closed around empty air where an arrow should have been.

  "I'm out!" he shouted across the storm-lashed deck.

  Tasya loosed her final shaft into the darkness, the bowstring's snap barely audible above the gale. Without a word, she melted back into the shadows, leaving Zyren alone at the stern rail with nothing but the storm's fury for company.

  The night had devoured everything. Rain hammered the Iron Kelpie's deck in relentless sheets, each drop striking like hammerfalls against an anvil. On the horizon, the Imperial patrol ship's flames finally surrendered to the torrent—those defiant blazes that had burned impossibly long through the storm's fury, as unlikely as the arrows he and Tasya had somehow managed to loose true in such chaos. Both the fire and their desperate archery were finished now, both having left their mark on the Empire's hunters.

  Two battered hulks drifted in the tempest's grip, waves shoving them about like toys discarded by some titanic child. The Iron Kelpie reeled under the assault: her mainmast hung at a sickening angle, the crow's nest reduced to splinters, and seams along her hull gaped wide enough for the hungry sea to pour through.

  Zyren's eyes searched the deck for Parvani's familiar figure among the crew, that automatic reflex of seeking the woman who had fed them through every storm. The woman who had brought him warm soup during his first night aboard, when nightmares of the Burned Forest still haunted his sleep. The space where she should have been working felt like a wound—obvious in its absence, impossible to ignore. The other sailors moved with frantic purpose around that empty space, their faces etched with pain and shock, yet their bodies continued the work of survival as if death had never touched their ship.

  The Iron Kelpie's fate hung on her crew's ability to keep her afloat, and their fate hung on reaching safe harbour.

  Zyren stood motionless amid the commotion, feeling strangely detached from his own body. His gaze fixed on the spot where a ballista bolt had found its mark, where Parvani had been standing one moment and simply... wasn't, the next. In that terrible silence between lightning and thunder, he could hear her voice fading, as if she was moving away from him.

  "Below deck!" Thaln's voice cut through both gale and grief, snapping Zyren back to the present. "We need every hand on the leaks!"

  His numbness shattered. This was no time for mourning. Zyren sprinted for the companionway.

  The Iron Kelpie chose that moment to plunge from a wave's crest like a stone dropped from a tower. The impact as she struck the trough sent Zyren tumbling down the final steps, his shoulder cracking against the wet planks below. He struggled upright, boots skidding on the flooded deck, and lunged toward a stream of seawater jetting through a split in the hull.

  As he fumbled for planks and oakum, movement in the shadows caught his eye. Bruln crouched protectively over two still forms, and Zyren's heart clenched as he recognized the scene. Even in the dim light, he could see Parvani's colourful tunic—the crew had brought her body below deck, a gesture of respect that would allow them to mourn properly when survival no longer demanded their full attention.

  A soft moan drew his focus to the second figure. Kaelith lay beside Parvani, her face drained of colour.

  He dropped to his knees beside them. "What happened to her?" The question came out hoarser than intended, his eyes unable to leave Parvani's peaceful expression.

  "Broken rigging," Bruln rumbled, his usually gruff voice gentle. "Rope snapped when that last bolt hit. Heavy barrels broke loose. She was right in their path. I shoved Kaelith clear, but not fast enough. Her arm took the impact."

  Kaelith's jaw clenched against obvious pain. "I'm fine," she hissed through gritted teeth, though her grip on Parvani's cold hand suggested otherwise. "Bruln saved my life. Now go help the others patch this floating coffin." Her voice caught slightly. "Just... bring that rum bottle closer first."

  Bruln poured with unsteady hands, amber liquid splashing as the deck lurched beneath them.

  Zyren forced himself to focus on the immediate crisis. The wildly swinging lantern sent shadows dancing across Kaelith's injuries, the ship's constant pitching making it nearly impossible to work steadily. "Break this into pieces," he instructed, pressing a broom handle into Bruln's grip.

  While the Cragling snapped the wood into usable lengths, Zyren splashed rum over Kaelith's mangled arm. She jolted at the burn, teeth clenched so hard he could hear them grinding. "No splinters that I can see," he murmured, falling back on Sylvaen's teachings from their years at the tavern. "But this should prevent infection."

  He selected two straight pieces of the broken broom handle. "This is going to hurt," he warned, meeting her eyes. "I need to set the bones properly before splinting them."

  "Bottoms up," Kaelith muttered, draining her cup in one swallow.

  Zyren's hands trembled as he positioned the makeshift splints. Memories flooded back—not just of Sylvaen's patient voice guiding his young fingers through similar procedures in the Verdant Shadow's back room, but of all the travellers who had passed through their tavern. Wounded soldiers from forgotten skirmishes, merchants injured by bandits, adventurers who had pushed too hard into dangerous territory.

  "Firm but gentle, like holding a frightened bird," Sylvaen had taught him during those quiet moments after the tavern closed, when Faelar would stack chairs and they would tend to whoever needed help. "Too loose and the bone won't heal straight. Too tight and you'll cut off the blood flow."

  As he worked, his gaze drifted involuntarily to Parvani's still form. She had been another healer in her own way, nourishing their bodies and spirits with her cooking and her unfailing warmth. The woman who had wrapped him in kindness when he was nothing but a confused refugee from his old life, who had fed him when nightmares stole his appetite.

  The ship's rolling made every movement treacherous. Just as he began to align the broken bones, the Iron Kelpie lurched violently to starboard. The bones shifted with an audible crack. Kaelith's scream tore through the hull like a blade, but Zyren held firm, completing the alignment as Sylvaen's steady voice whispered in his memory.

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  Her face glistened with sweat and tears when he finished binding the splint in place, but the arm was properly set.

  "Stay here where it's safer," Bruln advised, rising to his full imposing height. "We'll need you whole for whatever comes next."

  Kaelith managed a weak smile, though tears continued to carve tracks through the grime on her cheeks. "Go," she whispered. "Save our ship."

  Before turning to help with the leaks, both Zyren and Bruln paused for a moment beside Parvani's body. Her face looked peaceful despite the violence that had claimed her, as if she'd simply chosen to rest after feeding one last crew.

  "Move!" Kaelith's sharp command broke the spell.

  They threw themselves into the desperate work of keeping the Iron Kelpie afloat. Every repair became a battle fought twice—once against the sea pouring through their wounds, and once against the ship herself as she bucked and rolled

  The deck above proved even worse.

  "Bruln!" Yrrig's voice cut through the wind. "Cargo shifting by the mast! We need your strength!"

  Zyren found himself pressed against Thaln and Hisoka, all three wrestling with water-heavy ropes as they fought to raise what remained of their canvas. The Pelagor's webbed hands worked with desperate efficiency, his gills fluttering as he fought to maintain focus through exhaustion.

  "Careful now!" Hisoka barked, her red hair whipping across her face. "One more tear and we'll have no sail at all!"

  "Easy does it," Thaln added, his voice strained.

  Time became meaningless. Rain erased the boundaries between day and night, sky and sea merging into walls of black water and wind. The Imperial patrol ship vanished completely—either claimed by the storm or lurking somewhere beyond the veil of rain and darkness, waiting to finish what they'd started.

  Three days crawled by before the weather finally broke.

  The silence felt more oppressive than the storm's roar. After such violence, the sudden calm pressed down on them like a lead blanket, heavy with unspoken grief and the weight of impossible odds.

  Parvani's absence haunted every corner of the ship. Her missing laughter, her concerned questions about their well-being, the empty galley where no one had quite managed to fill her role—all of it formed a shadow darker than any storm cloud. Zyren found himself listening for her voice, expecting her to appear with a bowl of soup and words of encouragement that could chase away even the darkest thoughts.

  When the sea calmed enough, Urdan ordered Parvani's body brought topside. The crew gathered in respectful silence as they prepared her for the traditional sea burial. Zyren and Hisoka took charge of the grim preparations, carefully removing splinters from her wounds and dressing her in the finest clothes from her sea chest.

  The ballista bolt had struck her left side with devastating force, tearing away flesh and bone. Her left leg was simply gone—claimed by the sea in those first chaotic moments. They worked with gentle hands, treating her remains with the reverence due a fallen comrade who had chosen to fight against an empire.

  "She used to talk about the old recipes," Hisoka said quietly as they worked. "Dishes from her grandmother's time." Her hands stilled for a moment. "Guess we won't taste them anymore."

  Now the Iron Kelpie drifted under pale sunlight, her hull groaning with each small swell. Water still seeped through their patchwork repairs, forcing the crew to take shifts at the pumps. Two ragged sails caught what breeze they could find, pulling them forward at barely more than walking pace.

  The crew had pushed themselves beyond exhaustion. Yrrig and Thaln maintained their watch at opposite ends of the rail, but their usual banter had died. Bruln sat motionless near the mainmast, staring at the deck planks as if they might reveal some way out for them. Tasya and Hisoka were nowhere to be seen.

  Kaelith's condition worsened with each passing hour. The fever that had begun as her body's natural response to trauma was becoming something more dangerous. Zyren emerged from the captain's cabin carrying her empty bowl, noting how her eyes had lost their focus, how her breathing had become shallow and rapid.

  He crossed the deck toward the water barrel, each step feeling like it required tremendous effort. Their supplies were nearly exhausted—another consequence of the Empire's relentless pursuit.

  "How is she?" Urdan's deep voice rumbled with barely contained worry.

  "The fever's getting worse," Zyren admitted, unable to keep the defeat from his voice. "I've done everything I know, but without proper herbs, without clean supplies..." He gestured helplessly at their surroundings. "We need to reach land soon..."

  The thought of losing Kaelith felt like losing his last connection to the person he'd been before learning the truth. She had deceived him, manipulated him, but, due to her, his eyes opened to the genocide that had shaped his entire existence. Without her, he would still be wandering around, ignorant of his people's fate, and wasting his life.

  "We'll make it." Urdan said, though his knuckles remained white on the wheel.

  Zyren nodded, drawing what comfort he could from the orc's stubborn certainty. He approached Yrrig's position at the port rail. "What exactly are we watching for?"

  The satyr's golden eyes never left the horizon. "Smoke," he answered, his normally cheerful voice flat as old rope.

  "That′s where we'll land?” Disbelief and desperation were evident in Zyrens voice

  "Not where," Yrrig replied, his hooves shifting restlessly on the deck. "but when..."

  "Smoke!"

  Thaln's shout cracked like a whip across the still air. Every head turned, every eye strained to follow his pointing finger.

  There—barely visible against the pale sky—a thin column of grey rose from the distant horizon. To desperate eyes, it blazed like a beacon of salvation, a sign that somewhere ahead there was a harbour for them.

  Three days since the storm had nearly claimed them all. Three days of slow dying—food reduced to scraps, water measured in precious sips, Kaelith burning with fever in her bunk while their cause hung in the balance. The Iron Kelpie herself had become little more than floating wreckage held together by determination and the stubborn refusal to let sink.

  Urdan studied their pitiful progress, his scarred face grim. "At this pace, we're looking at another full day to reach that smoke."

  "Kaelith may not have another day," Thaln said quietly, voicing what they all knew. "And if the Empire has ships around here..."

  The orc captain surveyed his broken ship and exhausted crew. When he spoke again, his voice carried the weight of command and the desperation of a man who understood exactly what failure would cost. "Then we push everything we have left. We didn't come this far to give up now." He raised his voice to a roar that seemed to wake the very timbers: "All hands! Make ready for full sail!"

  The crew stirred to life with their final reserves of strength, driven by more than just survival instinct.

  "Thaln, take the helm! Bruln, with me!"

  Zyren threw himself beside Hisoka, hauling on lines that felt heavier than anchor chain. Together they fought to stretch every scrap of remaining canvas, coaxing the wounded Iron Kelpie to find speed she shouldn't possess.

  "Yrrig!" Urdan bellowed, pointing toward the shattered crow's nest. "Rig a line up there! We're stripping her down!"

  The satyr bounded up the rigging with his characteristic agility, seemingly unaffected by exhaustion.

  "Everything broken goes overboard!" the captain commanded. "She needs to be light enough to fly!"

  One by one, pieces of splintered wood and twisted metal splashed into their wake. The ruined crow's nest followed, along with damaged casks and torn sailcloth—everything that added weight without adding function.

  Slowly, reluctantly, the Iron Kelpie began to respond. Her torn sails filled with what breeze they could catch, and her battered hull started cutting through the waves with something approaching her old grace. They were racing against time itself, gambling their last strength on one final push toward land.

  The column of smoke grew more distinct against the sky, its dark promise pulling them forward like a lodestone.

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