“What is it?” Zoric leans over my shoulder, dripping salt water onto the journal.
“TheSilver Fortune.” I trace the words with a trembling finger. “She went down thirty years ago carrying ninety-five thousand gold in tribute. This captain—he knew where she sank.” I flip through more pages, searching. “If I can find coordinates, or even a general heading...”
“TheSilver Fortune’s in the deep water.” Margit’s voice is sharp. “Below where any of us can safely dive. The depth alone would kill you, and that’s before you factor in?—”
“Factor in what?”
The old woman’s mouth thins. “Stories. The kind sailors tell to scare apprentices. But I’ve seen things in the deep water, girl. Lights that move against the current. Shapes that don’t match any fish I know.” She shakes her head. “TheFortune’s been down there thirty years. If she was recoverable, someone would have claimed her by now.”
“Maybe no one’s known exactly where to look.” I hold up the journal. “This captain traded with Merrit. He might have recorded the planned route, or the last known position, or?—”
“Or you might be chasing a ghost story to avoid facing the truth.” Margit’s tone isn’t cruel—just honest. “We’re not going to make Gyla’s deadline. Not with the wrecks we can safely reach.”
Margit’s assessment stings. I want to argue—want to insist that there’s still hope, that the journal changes everything, that much gold is worth any risk. But she’s right. Even if I find theSilverFortune, even if the depth doesn’t kill us, we’d be diving into waters that every sailor in the region considers cursed.
Cursed. Again.
“Let me read the rest.” I tuck the journal into my vest. “Maybe there’s useful information. Maybe not. But I’m not giving up until we’ve exhausted every option.”
The afternoon divesyield another fifteen hundred gold. Our total sits at so little, it’s heartbreaking counting it.
I spend the evening in Zoric’s quarters, poring over the journal while he sits across the table, cleaning salvaged jewelry. Comfortable silence fills the space between us—the kind that doesn’t need words. His presence is enough.
The captain’s handwriting is cramped and difficult to parse in places. Water damage has claimed whole sections. But slowly, a picture emerges.
TheSilver Fortunewasn’t just carrying tribute. She was carrying older gold—treasure that had been collected as “offerings” to whatever lurks in the Wrecktide’s depths. A tradition dating back centuries, meant to appease the ancient presence that sailors have sensed in these waters for generations.
They feed it, the captain wrote.Every generation, they send a ship loaded with gold into the deep channel, and the sea stays calm for another thirty years. TheFortunewas this generation’s sacrifice.
The implications make my stomach turn. Thousands in gold sent to the bottom deliberately. Not a shipwreck—a tribute.
“Zoric.” My voice sounds strange to my own ears. “Look at this.”
He moves to my side, reads over my shoulder. His breath catches on the same passage that stopped mine.
“They sank her on purpose.”
“To feed it.” I flip back to an earlier entry. “The captain mentions ‘ancient feeding grounds.’ The same phrase appears three times. Whatever’s down there, people have known about it for generations. They’ve been appeasing it.”
“Oreth’s curse.” Zoric’s jaw tightens. “The gold that created him—it came from the deep treasury. Someone must have found the tribute. Took what wasn’t meant for them.”
“And woke it up.” The pieces click into place with horrible clarity. “The curse wasn’t random. It was—retaliation. Punishment for stealing from whatever’s being fed down there.”
“Then our destroying Oreth...”
“Might have made things worse.”
We stare at each other. The journal sits between us, its water-damaged pages carrying secrets that suddenly feel much heavier than paper should.
“We can’t tell the others.” My voice sounds distant even to my own ears. “Not yet. They’re already scared.”
“And you?”
“Terrified.” I manage a smile that feels more grimace than humor. “But terror’s never stopped me before.”
He reaches across the table. Takes my hand. His grip is warm, solid, the calluses on his palms rough against my skin.
“We’ll figure it out.”
