Azora's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Azora had sailed two years as a man to earn command of this crew, the same crew that once left her scarred and marooned. Now she stood at the mast with a knife pressed to her ribs. Her shirt was torn open. The bandage that flattened her chest had slipped loose in the storm. "A woman," the first mate said. He spat on the deck. The men closed in. They had trusted her blade, her charts, her word. Now they saw only a liar. Azora did not beg. She reached for the knife at her own belt, the hunting blade with the polished mahogany handle. Her father had given it to her before this same crew took everything else. She got the tip against the first mate's throat. "I found this ship's course," she said. "I found the treasure you're too stupid to reach." He laughed. Six men grabbed her arms. They pried the knife from her hand and threw it to the deck. Then they lifted her over the rail. The sea churched black below. Azora hit the water hard. The cold drove the air from her lungs. She saw the hull slide past. She saw the knife spin down through the green water beside her, sinking with her. She grabbed it. She would not lose it too. She sank. Salt burned her scars. Her legs kicked, but the weight of her clothes pulled her down. She thought of the crew above, drinking, sailing off. She thought of the captaincy she had almost taken. Rage filled her faster than the water. Then the water stopped killing her. Azora breathed. She breathed the sea. Her legs pressed together and would not part. When she looked down, scales caught the dim light. Her voice changed too. She hummed once and the sound carried far, low and strange. Something answered. Below her lay a wreck half buried in sand. Gold spilled from its broken hull. Chests. Coins. A hoard no living man had touched. She swam down and knew, the way she now knew the tides, that this was Blackbeard's treasure. And she was bound to guard it. The knowledge sat in her bones like a chain. Azora circled the gold. She could not leave the wreck. The sea held her here as surely as the crew had held her arms. But she still gripped her father's knife. And she could still sing. Above her, the crew's hull was a small dark shape on the surface. They wanted this treasure. They would come back for it. They would have to pass through her water to reach it. Azora watched the shape shrink toward the horizon. She was no longer a woman they could throw overboard. She was what waited beneath their prize. When they returned, she would sing them down. Then she would take the ship that was always meant to be hers.