I didn’t feel the surf batter me into the cliff as I climbed the moss-slick boulders. The Atlantic would’ve been frigid this time of year, but I couldn’t feel the water as it soaked into my clothing.

With fingers locked around the boots and cutlass, I made it to my mother’s side.

She lay on a rock twice her size, her neck twisted at an unnatural angle. I curled up against her chest and touched the red skin around her open eyes, collecting the tears there.

“I loved him, too, Mother.” Agony unfurled in my breast. “Why did you leave me? I needed you.”

Blue eyes of glass stared back.

She doesn’t see me.

I tucked the boots and cutlass between us and pulled her arm around me. A trickle of blood fell from her mouth. I wiped it away and burrowed closer, burying my face in her neck.

The soft silk of her hair fluttered against my lips as I sobbed. Her delicate frame lay like twisted driftwood against me. I pulled her closer, straightening her skirts, arranging her limbs, and clinging to her embrace.

There was only so much suffering a person could endure before they broke. Sometimes, broken things couldn’t be put back together.

My body wasn’t broken like my mother’s, but I was empty all the same. And tired. So very tired.

Closing my eyes wasn’t hard. They pulled shut on their own.

When I opened them, I was greeted by nightfall.

Moonlight sparkled over my mother’s skin, giving her an ethereal glow. Eventually, someone would find us and take her away from me. Or maybe the crabs would take her. I leaned up to flick one from her hair, and a pair of jackboots stepped into my view.

Craning my neck, I looked up to find Charles Vane standing over me.

I licked cracked lips and rasped, “My father…”

“I tried to rescue him.” He crouched beside me, his expression unreadable in the moonlight. “They hanged him at dawn. Moved the gallows to the beach and did it right there to send a message to us. His crew.”

“You were there?”

He nodded stiffly. “So was she.” He glanced at the countess. “Your mother?”

“Yes.”

“She arrived as it happened and…” His brows furrowed as he gazed up at the peak of the cliff. “She went mad.”

I followed his gaze. “Did it take her pain?”

“I suppose it did.”

“This day took everything from me. Everything I loved. Everything I had.” I studied the rocky face of the cliff, wondering if I had the strength to climb it.

“Not everything.” He bent over me and scooped up my mother’s body from the rock. “I couldn’t save Captain Sharp, but I can save you.”

As he strode away with her, I pondered his words with a sluggish mind. Did I want to be saved? What was left to salvage?