Barnacle Deepcurrent crouched under the wharf, water lapping his knees, and stared at the shore he could not cross. Somewhere on that dry land lay a treasure trove he had chased across three currents. His maps ended here. But two nights ago fishermen had glimpsed his face, the writhing tentacles, the wet gleam of his squid eyes, and they had fled screaming. Now the town watched the water. Lanterns lined the beach. Men held gaffs and nets, waiting for the monster to surface. He pressed a webbed hand to his chest and counted the guards. Six, maybe eight. He could not walk past them. He could not swim past them. Every hour on land was an hour closer to the trove, and every hour cost him nothing but this: he was trapped in the shallows like bait. A small boat slid under the wharf without a splash. In it stood a man in a purple coat crusted with gold, a peacock plume bent across his hat. He grinned at Barnacle as if a squid-faced stranger were the best luck he'd had all week. "You're the sea devil they're all wetting themselves over," the man said. "Captain Sebastien Flambeau. I've frightened this town for years. Never once with my face." He looked at Barnacle's tentacles and laughed. Barnacle's grip tightened on the piling. "Move your boat. I need the shore." "You need cover," Flambeau said. "Those idiots are hunting a monster. So we give them a hero." He reached under his bench and dragged out a canvas sack. It moved. Then a head pushed through the opening, feathered and feline at once, a bobcat's body under a parrot's bright wings. The creature hissed, shook loose, and crouched in the boat, feathers flaring green and red. "Wildcat with wings," Flambeau said. "Been raiding the fish stalls all month. They'll believe it did the screaming. Chase it, and they forget you." Barnacle understood. He gripped the winged cat before it could bolt. It shrieked and clawed his arm, and he flung it hard onto the beach, into the lantern light. The town roared. The creature spread its wings, screeched, and tore between the guards. Gaffs swung. Nets flew. Every man on the sand turned and ran after it, shouting that the monster had legs, the monster had feathers, the monster was on the shore. Barnacle hauled himself onto the empty sand. Salt water sheeted off him. He ran low behind the beached boats while the whole town chased the wrong beast into the dunes. Flambeau called softly after him. "There's an old woman up the hill who buys and sells strange things. If your trove is real, she's already heard of it." Barnacle stopped at the tree line, dripping, free of the water at last. The beach was his. But the guards would find only a wildcat, and soon they would know the monster still walked among them.