I leaned in, transfixed. The map was beautifully drawn in colored inks that rippled over water and shore, and my eyes devoured the unfamiliar coastlines. Not even my father had owned a map like this. “It’s beautiful,” I said, running a hand along borders the artist had rendered in elegant loops and twists that brought to mind currents and waves.

“Is that what it looks like?”

“What, the ocean?” I began to laugh, and then I saw her face. She was serious. “In a way, I guess. It’s blue. But . . .” I trailed off, picturing the sea’s many faces. “It’s blue like snow is white, or winter is cold. Blue is just a word. It doesn’t do it justice. And it’s not always blue. Sometimes it’s gray, or even black, and when the sun hits the water it turns gold and the froth on top of the waves is as white as cream. And it sounds like wind in the pines. I used to wake up when I heard the pines in the village, thinking I was back home.” I broke off.

“They say there are monsters in the waves,” she said, pointing to a beast with too many fins, drawn in exquisite detail.

“There are monsters everywhere.” I met her eyes. “But there are wolves in the water. Sailors have seen them.”

“Wolves?” She rolled up the map, arching an eyebrow in disbelief, and opened another scroll. This one contained a drawing of a ship.

“That’s a pirate ship,” I said, pointing at the narrow hull. “You can tell by how it’s built. They’re fast. They have to be.”

“All scavengers are fast.”

“My father lost his cargo to pirates once.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t sea wolves?”

I glared at her. “If it had been sea wolves, they would have taken the men, not the gold.”

She leaned against the table, watching me. I felt a flush creep up my neck under the scrutiny. “I wanted to see the ocean once,” she said.

I tried to picture her standing on a wharf or striding across the deck of a ship, the wind snatching at her hair. I couldn’t. She was ice and snow and mountains. “Why didn’t you?” I asked.

“A hundred reasons, and then it didn’t matter.” She touched the parchment.

“Who were you, before you were the Huntress?”

She looked up, and I saw another woman in her face, a flicker of longing and loss. “Someone else.”

“I think I would have liked to meet that person,” I said, surprising myself.

A shadow fell across her eyes. “I am glad you didn’t.”

“Why? How could you be—” I cut myself off before I finished the sentence, but she heard the words I hadn’t said. I could tell by the icy calm that descended once again over her features.

“How could I be any worse than this?”