Chapter 1

Alba never knewthe name of the town where his mother came from; he did, however, know that should he ever return to an empty house in Welkin, he could go there to find her. She'd said as much, every time they had to hug goodbye after another single night he was allowed to visit between long stretches at sea. Should you ever return to an empty home, don't believe anything they tell you. You'll always find safe harbor under the moon.

He assumed there was a reason she was never specific, he assumed she would leave a note telling him where to go if the day ever came. But the rainy, cold morning he limped through the door, smelling of sweat and moldy straw from the journey by train, the house was as silent as his ringing ears. Only his hands dragging along the old, familiar wallpaper made any sound. His heavy footsteps, having to shuffle his aching hip as it still hurt too badly to put weight on. The grunting breaths of the chaperone who followed behind him with every step, knowing to not let Alba out of his sight while inside.

The only sound left to assure him that house had once been his, was the jingling of his mother's chimes from the kitchen window, tousled by the wind and whistling lightly every time air passed through the notches carved in dangling silver tubes.

Some things remained in their places, but Alba knew not to trust them. He knew it was likely that no one had been back to that house in at least a week, maybe two—exactly as long as it took him to get back home with his injury.

Edythe Marsh left behind her nicest shirts and dresses—but her work clothes were missing. The shoes she wore to church remained on the shelf by the door—but her walking boots were missing. Creature comforts like her favorite perfume, hair brush, hand lotion, face powder were exactly where they always were whenever Alba came to visit—but the hair clip he'd once gifted her, one she wore every day, adorned with pearls and plate-pressed with the image of a mermaid, was nowhere to be found.

Alba knew better than to mention it to the man who followed on his heels between each room. Reminding himself what she'd always said. Don't believe anything they tell you.

He searched high and low for any sign of where she wanted him to follow, where exactly on the sea he should search to find her. He had a limited amount of time at his fingertips, pretending everything he did was done to gather his small number of allotted belongings to take with him to Belmar, every now and again inciting a grunt of warning from the man who hovered in the doorway while Alba rifled through his mother's nightstand. Alba never responded, focusing his entire being into keeping calm. Knowing he wouldn't get a second chance once he left the house behind.

They would clear out his mother's things, a new family would move in. It would be as if Edythe and Alba Marsh had never existed in that little house with the old wallpaper, flowers painted on the ceiling beams overhead, broken windows patched with newspaper, jars of candles in the cupboards, his childhood bed carved with ocean waves and smiling fish and a cluster of mer-people who swarmed around his pillow like a halo of protection against nightmares. That's what his mother always told him. They appreciate the color of your hair every night while you sleep. Oh, what they wouldn't give for a piece of it! Stories told to him long before his legs were ever long enough to tap his feet against the footboard. He could only just count the number of times he'd laid beneath the carved mer-people since then on two hands.

Perhaps the new family who took their place would have someone small enough to lay in that bed and dream of the sea, too. They would hope the same things Edythe and Alba's father once had—that a job with the Warren Sailing Company would be life-changing.

They would find where Edythe had tracked Alba's height from when he was a child, notched into the post in the kitchen cupboard. He wondered if they would consecrate a stone and jar of sea water in the back yard as an altar to a sailor lost at sea, just like his mother had; set for Alba's father, starved to death on a northern ice-locked ship then eaten by crew mates who inevitably died right alongside him.

Alba used to shudder at the thought; but since returning home years prior knowing what it was like to fear for one's life on an ice-locked ship in the north, knowing what human flesh tasted like on his own tongue, he'd realized to die first was actually a blessing.

They did not givehim a cane to aid in walking, even when it became clear Alba's hip might never heal enough that he'd be able to wander without a limp. Some days were better than others, some days the injury felt more like a dull ache while others hurt as badly as the first time he hit the deck from the height of the mast.

He could usually count on it by the chill in the morning, the sight of storm clouds coming on the horizon, the groaning chorus of fellow once-sailors made redundant by similar injuries or age or other circumstances as the sun rose and the work bell rang. Alba was hardly the youngest amongst them; he counted himself lucky to still be able to limp his way down the stairs at all. It meant he would have an early chance at breakfast, at least. A cruel weight added to the pressure in his limbs, making them creak with every movement, to have to put himself first in order to keep living.

Welkin was where families lived while their husbands, fathers, brothers, sons worked on ships set out to sea; built in the trees a two-hour wagon ride from Belmar on the shore, which smelled of rotting fish, seaweed melting to slime on the seawall where barnacles grew, tangled with decaying flesh of anything unfortunate enough to be caught there rather than in a net. The fish and crab Alba gutted morning to night behind the counter of Maggie's stall were lucky, he thought. Reminded with every slice of the knife through wriggling undersides.

So often, he gazed down at the sharpness of that blade and thought how it might feel to be sliced so smoothly, so effortlessly. He wondered if he would writhe with eyes bulging, gasping silently at the air until finally giving up and letting death come for him, accepting there was no other chance.

Every time he'd been faced with it, himself, there had always been the slightest chance, a reason to get himself free. Nearly drowned, stabbed, robbed in a port town—how many times had Alba lied there beneath a gloved hand, knife sharp and prodding at his belly, staring at the sky, compelling death to keep its distance because he wasn't ready to go? There was someone who would miss him. Someone back home would grieve him, would curse death and all its messengers. The small braid woven behind Alba's ear always said so. The grim knew it every time it coiled ghostly fingers through the plait and understood to keep its distance.

His mother used to always tell him, the sea rarely took someone who would be noticed gone. Someone who bore the mark of a protective braid behind the ear, especially when given by someone who knew the old magic of the sea. Alba never believed her, until he'd visit home once a year and she would insist on pulling out what he'd been so careful to keep knotted. In those few hours without the tightness on that patch of scalp, he never felt more vulnerable to the deadly fancies of the world.

Ever since those townspeople found him, weeks prior, dumped on their dock with a note pinned to his back, telling whoever found him to ship him back to the Warrens in Belmar for a reward—he hadn't felt the tug of the protective plait under his ear. Perhaps that was why he couldn't figure out where his mother had gone.

At the very least, Alba not knowing where to find her meant the Warrens and their dogs might never, either.

The knife in Alba's hand, morning and night, would continue to tempt him even when splattered with viscera from the day's catch, speckled with scales and splintered shells, reminiscent of all the times he stood on the edge of a ship deck gutting the same offerings while the sea tore beneath his feet, only a rope around his waist keeping him upright. Whispering apologies with every stripped spine tossed back into her, knowing it wasn't what she wanted, knowing why she rolled with such a bitter rage. Water that was always clear and blue so far from shore, muddy and brown with blood and vomit and rot in the shallows where Warren ships docked in comparison. Where men returned to land either on their feet or carried on their backs.

Water that lapped at his feet when he wasn't behind Maggie's stall gutting fish, shifting beneath where he hung scraping barnacles from wooden hulls, or polishing the visages of mermaids carved into wooden bows. Dark water hungry for anything not already dead. Beckoning him back, as if wondering why he no longer visited out where she was her most tempestuous. Teasing him with constant promises only he heard—whispers from the depths that if he gave himself to her tide, she might take him to where his mother was hiding.

You'll always find safe harbor under the moon. He ruminated on those words endlessly while staring at the ceiling where he slept, while his hands busied with grimy work, while standing on the cold workhouse roof at midnight when the ache in his hip made it impossible to sleep. Cigarette smoke filling his lungs, staring at the bright moon in the sky instead of allowing himself to think how easy it would be to jump and hit the dirt at the bottom. Knowing it might not actually be high enough, considering how being mastheaded only left him limping on land.

You'll always find safe harbor under the moon. The more the days waned on, the more Alba hated those words—until the morning came when his normally-empty telegram box contained a single card. A card he removed too quickly in the early rush, nearly dropping it to the floor.

Moon Harbor Telegram Office; Whitesand Cove, 051724-016.

TO: SEA PRINCE ALBATROSS MARSH.

MESSAGE: WICKIE. BLUECASTLE. FULL MOON.

Something struck him again and again in the center of his back. He turned to look, but it was only his own pounding heart thundering against his insides.

He swiftly tucked the telegram into the inner pocket of his jacket. Not sure what else to do, only knowing that he didn't want anyone to see. To ask. An instinctive, protective motion. A telegram from his mother, he was sure of it. The thing he'd been waiting for. Proof she was safe. A hint of where to find her. He was sure of it.

He touched it through his coat again and again as he left the workhouse and punched his timecard. As he approached the fish market, then Maggie's stall, claiming his seat at the worktable. As he took the carving knife and went about gutting the catch of the day.

He could leave after clocking out. Not sure exactly which direction to go, but—it would be a full night's head start. They wouldn't notice him missing until at least the next morning. They would have no idea where he went. He would figure it out before they did. He would figure out Moon Harbor. Whitesand Cove. Bluecastle. He only had to get out of Belmar, out of Welkin, out of the woods that surrounded them.

The thoughts circled endlessly in and out of the front of his mind as he worked, hands acting on reflex as every pale fish was the same beneath the knife. Moon Harbor Telegram Office. Whitesand Cove. Wickie. Bluecastle. Full moon. Perhaps that was why he didn't notice when the perpetual cacophony of the market quieted down into whispers, tension growing as bodies shifted to step out of the way of something moving through them. Someone smelling of rich perfumes and donning dress shoes and a fine coat had come to pay a visit, and Alba only noticed once he heard the voice speak his name.

"Heard you got a telegram today, Albatross." Josiah Warren leaned against the edge of Alba's worktable, careful not to stain the fabric of his coat. His dark brown hair was slicked back with pomade, beard cleanly trimmed and collar starched to stand straight. Flicking away a piece of fish meat with a leather-gloved hand, he laughed when it stuck to Alba's cheek. Alba ignored him, wiping it away without another glance and continuing his task.

"No such thing," he answered.

"Don't be coy. A handsome man like you is bound to get letters from all the hearts you broke in the north, hm? Was it a message from some lover missing you dearly? Some whore in a brothel crooning about how much they hope you'll come see them again soon? Come on, show me."

"It was a mistake," Alba insisted as plainly as the first time, though his movements with the knife stiffened. He took the next fish on the pile, skirting the blade down its scales before cutting it open and unthreading its spine from the meat. "Meant for someone else. No whores from the north callin' on me."

"Postman said you tucked it into your pocket."

"The postman is a liar." Alba spoke before he could close his mouth, agitation rising as clearly as his nerves. Josiah's eyes never left him, still sitting perched on the edge of the table. It wasn't the first time he insisted on being a pest—Josiah took an interest in bothering Alba any chance he got ever since they were children—but that morning was different. He wasn't only there to tease; he knew it, Alba knew it. They both knew Alba was lying, they both knew Alba wasn't about to give in so quickly.

He forced his mouth to remain closed. He reached for another fish, but that time Josiah grabbed his wrist. He squeezed it hard enough that Alba may have flinched, had he not grown so used to aching all over in the past weeks. Still, Alba finally met the man's eyes, surprised at the intensity of them. Despite the calm veil over his expression, Josiah's gaze was edging on frenzied, like he thought that would be his only chance to get Alba to speak. Like he knew, the moment the end-of-day bell rang, Alba would be long gone before anyone could try and stop him.

"It's none of your business who is sendin' me telegrams," Alba finally conceded, knowing there was no more point in trying to pretend. "S'not gonna get in the way of my work, neither. I know my place."

Josiah knew Edythe Marsh had fled. He knew Alba would run to join her the first chance he got, and getting her back where she could be used to ensure good behavior from him was likely high on Josiah's priorities, despite Alba being nothing. Despite Alba being no one, really. Josiah simply didn't like not being in control, even of the smallest rats in his fleet. He had something to prove as the last Warren son since his brother's passing, and Alba was easy to wrangle.

But while Josiah sat comfortably in manor houses drinking spirits and tracking Alba's worth in ink on paper over years of hard labor, holding his mother's wellbeing over him if he ever dared a thought to argue or run away for an easier life—Alba learned how to sail. He learned how to fistfight. He learned when to bow his head to a threat and take it, or when to turn and strike back.

Every one of those instincts, always folded and tucked away like old clothes in a trundle drawer whenever he returned to land, surged back to the surface the moment Josiah grabbed him again. As Alba's arm was shoved out of the way, allowing Josiah to reach into Alba's inner jacket pocket in search of the telegram.

Those survival instincts flared—and Alba did not hesitate to slam the carving knife straight into Josiah Warren's leg. Nor did he hesitate as Josiah stumbled back screaming obscenities. Alba leapt to his feet, kicked the stool away, turned the table over, and ran.

No one tried to stop him—they all just watched. Wondering if he would make it, wondering how far he would get before someone shot him in the back. Alba didn't turn to look.

He pushed through the splitting pain in his leg, his hip, up his side into his ribs, until it spread throughout the rest of him and diluted beneath the fire of adrenaline sparking his blood.

He sought the road; the trees; the moon; he sought his mother's promises of mer-people who would admire the color of his hair while he slept and grant him whatever wishes he could think of.

Alba would run for them until he finally dropped dead, or found the safe harbor she always promised existed.