PROLOGUE
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MORANA ZORESLAVA KILLED HER MOTHER.
Well, perhaps that was an exaggeration of sorts. She hadn't murdered her mother. And in fairness she blamed her father for cursing Yelena Zoreslava with a child that would corrupt her being, leaving her frail to finally die at the hands of a mere plague that had poisoned the streets of Ketterdam.
She was there one day and gone the next, her body carted off to Reaper's Barge and sooner rather than later Morana had been evicted from their tiny flat in East Stave. The slums of the city were beginning to rot from disease, corpses lining the streets, and panic wafting through every corner, of the closed-off city.
Finding a vessel that was leaving the city was harder than she realized but Morana managed to leave the decaying streets of the Barrel without catching the plague—or rather, dying from it.
And so, the Queen's Lady Plague had arrived and Morana had left. There couldn't be two plagues corrupting the streets of the crooked city. Her mother was dead so really, what did she have in Ketterdam that would get her to stay?
Morana was young when she left Kerch for the first time and traveled to Shu Han, hidden between the barrels of salted fish and spices from the trading vessel. And in Shu Han, well, she managed to get by on well-twisted lies and tricks only growing up in Ketterdam could've taught her. As well as a good illusion or two and those were her specialty.
She wouldn't go as far as calling herself Grisha—Saints knew, her mother never dared to, Yelena preferred to call her an abomination. Morana was fine with the latter, it had flare to it, making her sound unnatural, which really mustn't've been far from the truth.
Morana Zoreslava could bend and manipulate the darkness and light around her to her will, weaving strands of light and shadow to create dazzling displays of light that could trick the naked eye. Illusions. Mirages. Maddening sights left grown men sputtering in her wake.
She was sure it was Small Science, it had to be. She could not summon from anything, and in complete darkness could not control the light, and vice versa. Dawn, she found, was when she was more powerful, where she was faster and stronger and her wounds healed unnaturally quick. Those moments as the sun rose in the sky were when Morana felt more alive, and yet, the more power she used the bigger the toll it had on her afterward.
Which was why, she wouldn't go as far as calling herself Grisha. She didn't glow from using Small Science, she paled. It didn't make her healthy and peppy, it rather took a strenuous toll on her mind and body as if she'd been running for hours.
But with her illusions, living in Shu Han worked for a few years. Allowing herself to try and get by without a fuss, without corrupting another mother with a plague—not that she had those to spare, her only one was already gone. It worked well until it didn't. Until the day she was found.
"Lies only catch up to you if you let them," her mother used to tell her, "Run faster, Morana."
And she did. She ran from the people chasing after her in Bhez Ju, calling out to her by her mother's name through the darkness of the night. Because no one knew she existed, and her mother, her poor dead mother, was the one they were chasing.
Luckily for Morana, she looked like the spitting image of Yelena Zoreslava. Luckily as in utterly fucked.
Mother dearest loved to remind Morana, between life lessons and deathly tips, that she was the sole reason her life was ruined. That her father's spies were only after her because she had to run from him once she found out she was pregnant. That she loved Morana too much to let him corrupt her but that still didn't mean she wasn't her mother's little adorable life-ruining abomination. Yelena Zoreslava had a way with words.
Now her mother was dead, the ruination complete, and she was merrily haunting her daughter from the grave, by making sure that if anyone ever looked her way all they would see was a runaway bride (not that Yelena had been close to getting married to Morana's father). And the spies couldn't tell the difference. Her mother had been Grisha, life had planned for her to age slowly, and take more time to rot unlike the usual human being—too bad she had been poisoned by her daughter.
Morana stumbled into the harbor of Bhez Ju after losing the couple of people chasing after her in the crowded streets of the city. The smell of the ocean wafted in her nose mixed with the wretched smell of raw and rot fish. Scrunching up her nose, Morana panted, looking through the docks, searching for a ship with no flag—a private one. Her eyes narrowed as she glanced at the end of the docks where a ship rocked in the water, two long masts raised, its sails black in color, and the wood rotting clearly in the nighttime. The dreaded skull and crossbones flag of a pirate ship flapping in the wind.
Sighing as she glanced back at the alleyway she'd come from, Morana shook her head, "Better an oops than a what-if," she muttered to herself as she ran towards the pirate ship, reciting the words her mother so graciously taught her—words usually followed by a pointed look her way.
Morana wasted no time in making her way inside the ship, yet as soon as she stepped foot on the main deck, a sword slashed through the air and stopped at her throat. The feeling of the cold metal and the smell of rum oozing from its handler did nothing to assure Morana she'd made the right choice by waltzing into a pirate ship.
"Are you lost, little lady?"
Her eyes glanced to the side, finding the suspicious face of a bearded pirate, possibly twice her size and in desperate need of new teeth. Morana made her best to not look too long at his dark beard, which was dripping with (what she guessed was) rum around the mouth.
She grimaced. "Parlay?"
The big pirate let out a bark-like laugh and took his sword back, gesturing with his head to a pair of crewmen behind her, and as soon as she was free from the blade, Morana's arms were grabbed behind her back by two fellows who seemed to not know the meaning of a bath or personal space. She huffed in annoyance.
"Parlay," the big pirate echoed with a grin. He opened his arms wide and bowed. "Here stands the Captain, little lady. Bluebeard in your service."
"Your beard is black."
"It didn't use to be."
"How come it changed?" Morana asked, trying to keep the bite from her tone, the taunting smirk from her lips, the glare from her eyes as the men holding her arms seemed to be getting a tad too comfortable holding her.
"The seas were jealous of its color."
"Naturally." Morana nodded, pursing her lips as she gave the men behind her a side glance. "Captain Bluebeard, if you don't mind, I'd rather speak whilst not being manhandled."
Bluebeard shrugged and leaned against the mast in the center of the main deck. "They're not harming you, little lady. And I'd rather not have unwelcome strangers on my ship." He narrowed his eyes at her. "What do you want?"
"A temporary place on your crew," replied Morana instantly. Her eyes took a mere moment to glance back at the harbor, and relief flooded through her when she did not see anyone other than the fishermen a few docks over and the wandering drunk she'd met at the alleyway.
"And what do you have to offer? Other than bad luck on my ship?"
"Good luck?" offered Morana meekly.
Bluebeard let out a laugh and made a gesture with his sword. Then the two men holding her started dragging her towards the edge of the ship, the wooden slats creaking under their feet as they tried to get her back in the harbor. Morana's eyes widened.
"Wait! I can help! I guarantee you keep me on your crew...um, and, you'll be richer by the morning!"
The men stopped moving and Morana was shoved out of their grasp, and onto the main deck, where she was surrounded by the crew members, each one missing more members than the next, each one looking at her with suspicion in their eyes and apprehension. Morana found Bluebeard with his head cocked to the side, assessing her. "Alright, little lady, and just how will you do that?"
Morana clenched her jaw and sighed before she spoke, "Your crew and yourself have to swear on the code to keep my secret amongst the seas. It can not reach important ears, otherwise, any richness you have will be gone."
He pursed his lips and looked around the deck. There were murmurs among the crew, little shouts of imperceptible complaints and agreements. "Let us swear and throw her to the sharks!" one man shouted and Morana gaped.
Finally, Bluebeard conceded. "We swear, little lady, but if we're not rich by morning you're walking the plank, savvy?"
Then the ship sailed and Morana was led inside the Captain's cabin. It was bigger on the inside than it looked on the outside. Riches pilled every surface, golden coins served as paperweights and pearl necklaces were used to decorate the back of chairs. One thing was certain, Bluebeard was a damn good pirate. And a cheap one too. His ship was falling off its hinges and he was using gold as decoration.
"So?" Bluebeard raised an expectant brow at her, taking his heat off and placing it on the table, revealing a bald head filled with blue-inked tattoos. "How will you make us rich?"
"Richer," she corrected. "That's the deal."
Bluebeard rolled his eyes and waved her off with a hand. "How will you make us richer?"
"I can conjure illusions," replied Morana as she walked around the room, letting her fingers graze over the painting on the wall. "I'm a sea witch," she added, because one thing she knew about pirates was that superstition was in their blood and the sea was their religion. Sea Witches were mythical amongst them—feared.
"Yet we found you on land."
"I like to wander," replied Morana.
"And I'm supposed to take your word for it, am I?"
Morana turned to him with a smirk, and her eyes glanced over the lit candles of the cabin, the shadows lurking in every corner the light didn't reach, the gleam of the moonlight spilling through the window. It was enough for her to weave into a perceptible mirage.
Raising her hands, Morana weaved together light and shadows around her, creating a flash of blue in front of her, and as it dissipated she saw Bluebeard's pale face as he looked at her. Morana had illusioned herself to have tentacles for legs, to be bigger than she was, even though it was only for the Captain's eyes and really all she was, was standing before him with her hands raised and her head starting to ache from the effort.
Then she made the flash of blue appear again and when it dissipated all that was left was her own person, arms lowered, dressed in clothes belonging to Shu Han's tea shop gatherings, and a taunting smile playing at her lips.
She walked forward towards the Captain and was overjoyed to see him lean away from her. Morana grabbed a golden coin from his desk and twirled it around in her hand.
"You were smart to hear me out, I wouldn't be very happy if you threw me in the sea. Now—" she placed the coin back on the desk, "—I can use my powers to confuse any ship you like, so you can get inside and let your slimy little pirate fingers snatch any gold they have. I only request a temporary place on your crew and that we attack at dawn. Savvy?"
Bluebeard stammered and cleared his throat, nodding his head up and down, "Alright, little lady. We get richer and you can have the officer's quarters."
"Thank you, Captain. Now, which ship would you like to ransack?"
•••
Sturmhond was infamous. In Kerch, Shu Han, and clearly in the True Sea. The bane of pirates' existence was what she'd been told. A pirate hiding behind a license of a privateer and a true menace of the sea—because what Sturmhond did was everything a pirate did, and he managed to acquire a license for it. A lawful pirate. Scourge of the True Sea.
He was also the one Captain Bluebeard would like to plunder and pillage—because he was a hard one to usurp, keeping Grisha and non-Grisha on thethe crew gave for an unfair advantage.
And Morana had only a few hours before dawn to come up with an illusion that could help them overtake Sturmhond's ship—or she would have to walk the plank (she needed an illusion to avoid that one too).
Bluebeard had heard a rumor that Sturmhond was traveling the south of the True Sea with a stack of kruge bigger than the Sea Whip. Morana doubted the comparison between the two but said nothing on the matter.
Now, she stood on the front of the ship, overlooking the horizon as the night sky started clearing into a lighter blue, hues of yellow and orange peeking out as the sun began making its journey back to the sky over their heads. She could feel her headache from earlier clearing as the renewal of dawn filled her with strength. Abomination, her mother's voice rang through her mind, True Grisha don't take to dawn to renew them, they do it through Small Science.
Morana might've been an abomination but during dawn, she was a powerful one. An unnatural creature of nature that healed faster by a tenfold, that had the strength of a few men combined, and the speed of... a Sea Whip. For those minutes of dawn, Morana was impossible.
Sturmhond's ship was already in sight, close to them, and in a much better state than Bluebeard's—perhaps being a privateer really did make the difference. The latter ship was already concealed from sight by one of Morana's mirages. And then the true show began.
Closing her eyes, Morana pictured an armada of crimson ships, their image shivering in the sea, its crew members nymphs of the sea as ruthless as they were beautiful, dancing and bleeding in their silent fleet. When she opened her eyes she saw them, sailing through the ocean, where fog had gathered as per her request.
Chaos erupted as the sailors from Bluebeard's ship as well as Sturmhond's began getting restless, shouting profanities.
Some of the Sturmhond's Grisha tried to attack the armada of ships to no avail. Some grabbed ropes and threw themselves on deck only to fall through them and onto the water. Her mirages were just that, mirages. Phantom ships sailing through untouched waters.
"Let them see us, little lady, there's no honor in attacking behind the shadows," Bluebeard commanded and Morana nodded, lowering the mirage keeping them from sight.
And then Bluebeard's crew attacked and the fight broke out in Sturmhond's deck. Morana, kept the ruse of the crimson armada, fading it slightly minute by minute as the sun rose and her head began feeling faint.
Her eyes met the ones of a blond man fighting on the quarter deck of Sturmhond's ship, he frowned at her and Morana lowered her hands, wiping the blood from her nose as she smirked at him. And the distraction she caused, made him lose focus and fall unconscious from a blow to the head from the pirate he was fighting.
The kruge on his ship was soon placed on the deck of Bluebeard's ship and they were sailing away as Sturmhond's crew gathered their own from the waters of the sea (those who had fallen for the mirage) and processed the fact that they had been robbed blind and driven to insanity in a matter of instances.
Bluebeard joined her on the front of her ship and raised her arm in the air as he looked over his crew. "Scum! We have a new crew member! The Crimson Mirage has come to bless us!"
Morana let out a chuckle and turned to Bluebeard as he let her arm fall to her side. "Where's that bed I was promised, Captain?"
The moment she got to the cabin, Morana locked the door behind her and fell on the bed, passing out in a fell swoop, the energy drained out of her, letting the rocking of the ship against the waves of the sea lull her into a deep sleep, where blond pirates fell unconscious at her feet.
The myth of the Crimson Mirage was born that day. And Morana Zoreslava found a haven in the ocean—somewhere where her mother's face wasn't recognized, where she could go through life not being a plague.
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