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“My answer will always be no.”

Be reasonable,Corayne chided herself, even as she jumped out of her chair, fists clenched. The pirate captain didn’t move, her stare unbroken and unamused.

Despair bubbled beneath Corayne’s skin. She felt like a crashing wave, rolling over with foam as she broke upon the shore.Be reasonable,she thought again, though the voice was smaller, more distant. She dug her nails into her palms, using the sting to stay anchored.

“You don’t get to make my decisions for me,” she said with great restraint. “I’m not asking for permission. If you won’t take me on, I’ll find a captain who will. Who sees myvalue.”

“You will do no such thing.” Meliz shattered her wineglass across the floor. Her eyes lit from within, threatening to burn the world down. She took her daughter by the collar, and not gently. The crew took little notice.

“Look around,” she snarled in her ear.

Corayne kept still, unable to move, shocked by her mother.

“This is my crew. They’re killers, every single one of them.Lookat us, Corayne.”

Swallowing around the lump in her throat, she did as told.

The crew of theTempestbornwere a family, of sorts. Alike in their scarred hands, sun-damaged skin, bleached hair, corded muscles. Similar as brother to sister, despite their varying origins. They drank and fought and schemed as one, beneath a single flag, united before the mast and her mother’s command. Corayne saw them as she’d always known them to be: loud, drunk, loyal. But the warning echoed.They’re killers, every single one of them.

Nothing changed, and yet nothing was the same as before.

Her vision swam, and she saw them as the world did, as they were on the water. Not family, not friends. She felt like prey in a den of predators. A knife glinted on Ehjer’s hip, as long as his forearm.How many throats has it claimed?The big Jydi bruiser held hands with their navigator, golden Kireem, who was missing an eye. He lost it to gods-knew-what. Everywhere she looked, Corayne saw familiar faces, and yet they were unknown to her, distant and dangerous. Symeon, young and beautiful, his skin like smooth black stone, an ax balanced at his feet. Brigitt, a roaring lion tattooed up her porcelain neck. Gharira, bronze-skinned and bronze-maned, who wore chain mail everywhere, even at sea. And on and on. They dripped with scars and weaponry, hardened to the Ward and the waters. She did not know them, not really.

How many ships, how many crews, how many left dead in my mother’s wake?She wanted to ask. She wanted to never know.But you knew this—you knew what they were,Corayne told herself.This is what Mother wants, to frighten you away, to keep you onshore, alone in a quiet place at the edge of the world. A doll on a shelf, with only the fear of gathering dust.She bit her lip, forcing herself to remain steady and staring. The room was filled with beasts wearing human skin, their claws made of steel. If Corayne looked hard enough, she might see the blood all over their hands. As well as her own.

“Killers all,” Meliz said again, her grip unyielding. “So am I. You arenot.”

Corayne drew a shuddering breath, her eyes stinging. She blamed the smoky air.

“You think you carry no illusions, Corayne, but you are still blinded by many. Be rid of them. See us for what we are, and what you cannot be.” Meliz stared intently, her gaze intensified by the rim of dark color drawn around her eyes. Her voice softened. “You don’t have the spine for it, my dearest love. You stay.”

Never had Corayne felt so alone, so distant from the only family she knew.You don’t have the spine. You don’t belong.When Meliz let go of her collar, she felt as if she were falling, dragged away by an unseen tide. It was cold and cruel, and so unfair. Her blood flamed.

“At least my father was good enough to only abandon me once,” Corayne said coolly, her teeth bared. With a will, she stepped away from Meliz. “You’ve done it a thousand times.”

Only when she reached the cliffs did Corayne allow herself to break. She circled, eyeing the horizon in every direction. Over the water. Behind the hills, gnarled by cypress groves and the old Cor road. She wanted nothing more than the edges of the world she knew, the cage her mother would never let her escape. The Long Sea, normally a friend, became a torment, its waves endless beneath the starlight.

Even now, she casts me aside. Even when she knows how terrible this feels.

I thought she of all people would understand.

But Meliz could not, would not, did not.

Corayne knew why, in her marrow—she was different, she was not the same, she was separate from the rest. Unworthy, unwanted.

Adrift.

And there was a reason. Something she could not change.

“No spine,” Corayne spat, kicking the dirt road beneath her boots.

The stars winked overhead, reliable and sure. The constellations were old companions through many solitary nights. Corayne was a smuggler’s daughter, apirate’sdaughter. She knew the stars as well as anyone and named them quickly. It soothed her.

The Great Dragon looked down on the Siscarian coast, its jaws threatening to devour the brilliant North Star. Back along the cliffs, Lemarta glittered like a constellation of her own, clustered around her harbor, beckoning Corayne to return. Instead she kept walking, until the old white cottage appeared on the hillside.

Stupid to mention my father. Now, on top of everything else, Motherwillwant to talk and talk and talk about the man we barely knew, telling me nothing of use, only upsetting both of us.

Corayne liked to have a plan, an agenda, a list of objectives. She had none now. It set her teeth on edge.