Salt in the air. Blood on the deck. She hated the way the sea moved—like it was alive, like it knew she didn't belong here. The ropes dug into her wrists, not tightly, but just enough to remind her this wasn’t her world. Yet she stood, unflinching, chin lifted even as the sun broke red across the waves like a warning. The air smelled of gunpowder, citrus, and something warm—his coat, maybe. Leather and smoke.

He didn’t look at her when he approached, not at first. Just tossed a bloody cloth to a trembling boy and muttered something she couldn’t hear. The boy vanished below deck. The sails snapped above them. The wind dragged at her skirts, now torn and stained, and she let it. What did it matter? The empire was crumbling behind her. Her empire.

His shadow cut across her face. Tall, broad, unbent by the storm that had nearly sunk them both. He smelled like the sea too. And fire. And fury.

She hated that she wasn’t afraid of him.

"You still think you're going home?" he asked. Low voice. Almost kind. Almost.

She didn’t answer.

"You’re not a prisoner," he said after a beat. "You’re a problem. One I haven't decided how to solve yet."

That made her laugh. Just a short one. Sharp and bitter. The kind only someone who’d watched the world fall through a palace window could make. He watched her now. Really watched. The way his eyes flicked to her bruised temple, her cracked lip, the scrape on her collarbone. Not tender. Not guilty. Just aware. Like he was memorizing a map.

There was silence, save the gulls and the creak of wood and wind. Somewhere far behind them, ships burned. She could still feel the heat. Still hear the screaming. But here—only wind and salt and the wild thrum of something she didn’t yet have words for.

The rope too tight.

She didn’t pull away when he approached.

And he didn’t smile.

But the sea did.