Riptide

Two summers ago the riptide off Skerry Point dragged Garrick Thorsen out past the rocks and down into the green, and two pairs of hands brought him back.

He never saw their faces. He only woke on the sand of a hidden sea cave with salt in his lungs and two long wakes running out to the open sea.

Since then the big, weathered salvage diver of Port Hallow has climbed over Black Rock at every full moon to leave a gift on the stone above the cave pool: a whalebone comb, sea glass, his late fathers brass compass. Every morning the gift is gone and something strange and beautiful lies in its place. Thirty-eight, broad as a door and quietly lonely, he tells himself he only wants to say thank you.

Tonight is the autumn spring tide under the full moon, the one night of the year when the old stories swear the sea people come ashore. The village has latched its shutters. Garrick has lit his fathers lantern, waded the gully, and brought two silver rings he cant explain.

This time, someone is waiting in the water.

Coryn is huge, calm and commanding, with a voice Garrick has heard once before, in the green water. Nerith is quick, teasing and very sure of what he wants. They have been watching him for two years, and they have come with a black pearl and a question.

He can say yes. He can say the one word that stops everything. And before the sun clears the sea, he is going to find out exactly how the merfolk court a man they have decided to keep.