Chapter 4: Freebooter

The speedboat slipped out of the fog like a knife through skin, sunlight hitting them square in the eyes. Six hours running dark through the night, the hum of the motor steady as a heartbeat—and now, Freebooter.

It wasn’t a town so much as something stitched together out of scraps and stubbornness. Barges lined into canals like Venice, only louder, rustier, hungrier. Walkways snapped open and shut across the water, crowded with people—pirates—hauling crates, shouting prices, pushing carts. Flags clawed at the sky in every color, but one rose above them all: a monstrous banner, its tentacles curling around a skull.

Emma’s mouth fell open. Okay then.

Janie guided them toward the harbor, where the Harbor Master stood waiting in a golden tricorn hat. His eyes were sharp, cold as the deep sea. He didn’t bother with words—just scanned their papers, handed them back, and let them through. But not before pinning Emma with a look that made her shiver, like he was memorizing her face.

The marina was a patchwork of countries. Longliners from Japan. Catamarans from places Emma couldn’t pronounce. Hulls scarred from battles, not storms. The air was brine, diesel, and something metallic—like old coins.

Docked beside them, Seagull’s Special Delivery bristled with gulls glaring down like feathery debt collectors. A boy Emma’s age stacked crates at the gangplank.

“What is that?” Emma asked.

“A messaging service,” Janie said, matter-of-fact. “One squawk for yes, two for no. If someone’s ignoring you—say, your father—you send a gull-a-gram.”

Emma blinked. “Wait. That was you?”

Janie only grinned.

They stepped onto the dock, San Francisco already swallowed by fog as if it had never existed. The air here was alive—sharp with woodsmoke and salt, tinged with the tang of struck metal. Voices rose in a dozen accents, bouncing down narrow canals.

Barges became a marketplace of the impossible: cannonballs stacked in neat pyramids, aquaponic gardens lit by solar panels, quail coops squawking beside hologram maps. A father wrangled a toddler gnawing on a foam sword. An elderly couple haggled over fish. A woman strolled by with seaweed plastered over her eyes, gulls swooping above like they owned the place.

Everywhere Emma looked, someone was staring back. Not curious. Judging. Deciding.

A sign pointed them toward the Department of Piracy & Devil’s Teeth School Registration. Inside, skeleton hands pointed to rooms—Booty Taxes, Treasure Maps, Enrollment. One finger still wore a jeweled ring. Emma could have sworn it twitched.

At the desk sat a pirate with an eye patch and hook. His name tag read: My Name is Stan.

“Well shave me belly with a rusty razor! How can I help ye?” he boomed.

Janie slid over the forms. “Enroll my niece.”

Stan’s one eye swept over Emma. He slid a contract across the counter, warning of “kraken-related injuries and other causes too numerous to mention.”

Emma swallowed hard.

On the way out, she caught a wanted poster tacked to a bulletin board. The name glared back at her: Alister McConnell.

Emma opened her mouth to ask, but Janie tore it down in one motion, crumpled it, and tossed it into the bin. Her jaw was tight. Too tight.

They moved on. Pirates shouted deals. Bottles corked with kraken stoppers were hurled into the tide at the postal service. Somewhere in the crowd, a tall boy with sun-bleached hair met her eyes.

And then he was gone.

Freebooter seemed to breathe beneath her feet, alive with secrets. Emma felt the weight of every stare, every whisper. Somewhere out there, someone already knew her name.

And she had the sinking feeling her life would never, ever be the same.