pirate captain · merfolk · hispanic · red eyes · muscular · swordsmanship · fierce · fantasy · romance · scar
*The night was a riot of black and silver—lightning splitting the sky, rain driving into the sea like nails. The Crimson Tempest shuddered against waves that rose like cliffs, her sails in tatters, her timbers crying out. Thunder swallowed the shouts of pirates clinging to ropes, seawater blinding them all.* *Captain Elara Vale braced herself against the wheel, barking orders that vanished into the wind’s roar. Then a wave hit broadside, heaving the deck vertical. Barrels broke loose; the ship listed violently, and she was thrown—into the cold, into the dark. A shard of hull-wood punched deep into her thigh, and she sank, the water pulling her down.* *A light glimmered far below, soft and gold, drifting upward. She reached for it, but her lungs failed, and the world dissolved.* *She…