The sea changed color as they neared the island.
Gone was the cerulean shimmer of open waters. Instead, the waves grew thick—like oil—and shifted between green and black with every roll. The wind died completely.
Darion adjusted the sails of the borrowed brigantine, Duskwind, while Mara stood near the bow, staring ahead. Abyr of the Knives stood beside her in silence, his coat unmoved by any breeze, his expression unreadable.
"Feels like a graveyard," Mara said.
"It is," Darion muttered. "Griefwater Atoll was once used by the Drowned Monks. They performed sacrifices here. Children. Nobles. Pirates. Anyone the Queen demanded."
"And people let it happen?"
"They believed it kept her asleep."
Mara shivered. "So what happens now that she's waking up?"
Abyr's voice was soft. "She comes to collect."
Landfall
The Duskwind scraped against the sand of a ruined dock. Rotted posts stuck out like broken bones, and the jungle beyond seemed to whisper as the wind returned in thin, serpentine gusts.
Darion drew his cutlass. "We stick together."
Abyr didn't respond. He was already moving, silent as a ghost.
Mara hesitated, then followed. The compass pulsed in her hand, dragging her deeper into the jungle.
Vines dangled like nooses. The air smelled of rust and salt.
They reached a clearing—a circle of blackened stone surrounded by half-collapsed totems, each carved with screaming faces. At the center, a stone altar, stained with old blood.
The compass spun wildly.
"It's here," Mara whispered.
And then, the world shifted.
Memory's Prison
Mara staggered.
The jungle vanished.
She stood in a palace of coral and bone. Great windows opened into endless blue depths. Sea creatures moved outside—some too large, too wrong, to name.
She sat on a throne of polished obsidian.
Below her, thousands of Undrowned bowed in unison.
And in the waters behind her, a voice—deep, feminine, endless.
"You are mine."
Mara screamed.
The Waking World
Darion caught her before she hit the stone. She'd gone still, eyes wide, breathing shallow.
Abyr knelt beside them, gaze sharp. "She's seen it."
"The Queen?"
"No. Herself."
"What does that mean?"
Before Abyr could answer, the jungle erupted.
Figures surged from the trees—bodies twisted, skin split and flaking like wet parchment. Not Undrowned, but something older. Their faces had no eyes. Only mouths.
"Sacrificed," Abyr muttered. "But not devoured."
Darion drew both pistols. "Keep them off her!"
Gunfire tore the silence.
Abyr moved like wind and steel—blade flashing, always one step ahead of death. Darion took two down but was forced to retreat toward the altar.
And then, Mara stood.
Her eyes glowed faintly blue.
She raised a hand.
And the creatures stopped.
A voice echoed from her lips, though they barely moved.
"I forgive you."
The creatures screamed once, then crumbled into ash.
Darion stared.
"Mara?"
She blinked. The glow vanished. She collapsed into his arms, breathing heavy.
"I… I saw everything. The throne. The Queen. Me."
"What did she show you?"
Mara looked up, eyes full of horror.
"She showed me the future."
The Guardian of the Fragment
As the dust settled, a figure stepped from the jungle.
A woman in robes of eel-skin, her face covered in gold leaf, eyes milky white. She held a staff carved from reefstone.
"I am Vara, keeper of Griefwater," she intoned. "Chosen of the deep."
Darion raised a pistol.
Abyr held him back.
"She is the one we seek," Abyr said. "She guards the second fragment."
Vara's milky gaze settled on Mara. "You bear the Queen's blood."
"No," Mara said. "I reject it."
"You cannot reject the tide. You are the wave."
Darion stepped forward. "We came to destroy the fragment."
"Then face her test."
Vara struck the ground with her staff.
The altar split open.
Stairs descended into darkness.
Descent Into the Abyss
Torches flickered as they stepped into the tomb beneath Griefwater. Carvings lined the walls: scenes of cities drowning, of gods bound in chains of coral, of a queen weeping blood.
At the end stood a chamber shaped like a seashell. In its heart: a pedestal. Upon it, the second crown fragment—three jagged spires like broken fangs, still wet with some ancient liquid.
Mara reached for the null sigil.
But the fragment spoke.
Not aloud.
In her mind.
"Why destroy what is yours?"
She hesitated.
Abyr's sword unsheathed behind her.
"You must choose."
Darion looked between them. "She's not ready."
"She may never be," Abyr said. "The sea does not wait."
Mara closed her eyes.
The visions returned—thousands of dead kneeling, a crown of coral fusing with her skull, her hands soaked in red as fleets burned.
And beyond it all—freedom. Power. Control.
She opened her eyes and placed the null sigil over the fragment.
It shrieked. The room trembled.
The crown piece turned to salt.
Abyr nodded. "One down."
Darion exhaled. "Only three more."
But Mara didn't speak.
Because even as she destroyed the piece, a small part of her—hidden and quiet—had missed it.
Orders in the Dark
That night, as they camped on the ruined altar, Abyr moved into the jungle alone. He pulled a scroll from his coat. Syra's seal.
He broke it. Read. Burned the message.
Then he looked at the moon.
"I won't kill her yet," he whispered. "But if she claims the third piece…"
He didn't finish.
Because part of him, long frozen, now stirred with curiosity.
And dread.