The tide was unsettled that morning.
It rose earlier than usual, curling white foam over the dark sand as if the sea itself was impatient to reach the shore. The fishermen said it was a bad omen, that the ocean never hurried without reason.
Liora ignored them. Or at least, she tried to.
Barefoot, she walked along the edge where water kissed the land, her woven basket balanced against her hip. The wind tangled her hair, tossing strands across her face, carrying with it the smell of salt, seaweed, and something colder… metallic, almost like blood. She wrinkled her nose and pretended not to notice.
"Morning, Liora!" Old Marek called from his boat, his broad frame hunched over as he untangled his nets. His voice was always the same — gravelly, but warm when it was aimed at her.
"Sea's in a mood today," he added, jerking his chin toward the restless waves.
She forced a smile. "Then I should be quick before it decides to swallow my clams."
He chuckled, though his eyes lingered on her longer than usual. People often looked at her that way — not unkindly, but as though trying to solve a puzzle they couldn't quite name.
The truth was, there was nothing to solve. She'd been found here as a child, sitting alone on the far side of the bay near the great heaps of sand. No shipwreck had been reported. No family had come to claim her. She had simply… appeared.
She lived in that same place still, in a hollow beneath the dunes where the wind couldn't reach. Most people in Coral Bay thought it was odd, but they let her be. After all, she was always smiling, always ready to help with nets, errands, or watching the children.
Children like little Rina, who came sprinting down the beach now with a chipped pink seashell in her hands.
"For you, Liora!" the girl said breathlessly, holding it out as though it were a treasure.
Liora knelt to take it, her heart warming despite the gnawing anxiety curling in her stomach. "It's beautiful, Rina. I'll keep it always."
She tied the shell onto the frayed cord around her neck — a necklace already cluttered with trinkets the village children had given her over the years. It was heavy now, but she never took it off.
Behind them, the waves struck harder against the shore, a dull roar filling the air. In the noise, Liora thought she heard something else — something faint and almost human.
Her name.
She straightened sharply, scanning the empty expanse of water. But there was no one there. Only the glitter of sunlight on the tide and the shifting shadows beneath it.
She exhaled slowly, willing her racing heart to calm. It was nothing. It had to be nothing.
Still, her hand tightened on the basket handle as she glanced at the sun climbing higher in the sky. Four hours left.
Four hours until the change.
Her body was already warning her in small, cruel ways: a dull ache at the base of her spine, a strange tingling in her fingertips. She could ignore it for now, but not for long. When the time came, she would have to vanish — slip away to the hollow under the sand, hide until the storm inside her passed.
Because no one could ever see what she became.
Not the kind old fishermen.
Not the children who adored her.
Not anyone.