They said she could see the future in the bones of fish.
Esmeralda lived in the shadow of cliffs that sang when the tide was high, in a shack built from driftwood and old sails, hung with talismans that clicked in the wind. She was a fortune teller, a witch, a woman both feared and desired - neither of which she encouraged.
But he came anyway.
He arrived at dusk, limping, a worn cloak clutched around his shoulders and blood on his collar. He wasn't what she expected. No swagger, no bravado. Just exhaustion and those eyes - startlingly blue, like the sea on a clear morning. His hair was damp and tangled, and he smelled of brine and desperation.
"They said you could help me," he said.
Esmeralda watched him from behind her tousled fringe. "They say many things." Her earrings softly jingled as she tilted her head to one side.
"I don't want gold. I want to disappear."
She stepped into the light, out of her shed. Her skirts brushed against the door frame. "Disappearing isn't free."
He blinked, not in fear, but awe. "I'd heard stories... but you're real."
She smiled in amusement, soft lines around her eyes. "Are you?"
He gave a hoarse, weary laugh. "Not sure anymore."
His name was Luc. Once a privateer, then a fugitive. A price on his head in every port north of the Strait. But he spoke gently, listened when she talked, and didn't touch her things without asking when she allowed him to enter her shack.
Esmeralda didn't trust soft men. They were too often hiding something sharper beneath. But it turned out Luc only hid sorrow.
Over three days, she nursed his wounds. He watched her work her craft: how her hands stirred the potion, how she sang to the ingredients in a tongue older than the Empire. She didn't really offer comfort in conversation, but he found it in her silences.
On the fourth day, she brought him to the hidden tidepool grove beneath the cliffs.
"Take off your clothes. And sit down on the rocks. As promised there's a way to stay hidden," she said. "But it's not painless."
He looked at the ocean. "I've never been afraid of pain."
She saw the lie. He was afraid.
She kneeled town, touched his bare chest, marked him with ash and a dark, viscous paste. Her hands lingered a moment longer than needed. His breath caught.
"Stretch out your legs. Now this is where it may hurt. However there is one thing that makes it less painful. Do you mind?" He looked at her in confusion and fear.
Esmeralda lifted her skirts and in one fluid motion she sat down on Luc's lap. She was not wearing any undergarments, her soft, warm skin touched his thighs and despite the cold, hard rock underneath him, he couldn't help but feel heat built up inside of him.
"So, here comes your last chance to pull back from this. Do you still want to disappear from the face of the earth?"
"Everything that spares me from being imprisoned, tortured and executed is worth going through."
"Then, drink this and draw a deep breath."
She pulled a small red flask from her gurtle and handed it to him. The liquid smelled of seaweed and rotting fish but as soon as it touched his tongue it felt fizzy, almost electric. Then, his attention war drawn somewhere else.
His manhood was, in fact, very much erect when Esmeralda suddenly put her hand around his shaft. "This helps with what's about to come."
Esmeralda knew what she was doing, but still she was afraid. She had grown fond of Luc, even if she couldn't admit it to herself. And although she intended to remain emotionally detached, easing him through the transformation through physical pleasure caused her to get aroused herself, there was no use in fighting it.
