"Ugh~" Groaned Jake as he tried to relax while he stretched out his left side. “Piff— ahh— wha— what the fu— Oh… shit."

He was floating in a nightmare. There was no other way to describe it.

All around Jake, scraps of wood and bodies bobbed on gentle waves.

Stifling a yell, Jake regretted immediately turning around to see what was bumping him in the back of the head. He splashed and wildly kicked around himself as he tried to get away from the bloating body of a young man.

His movements were able to stir the water enough to send the body bobbing away. Jake then spun around as something bumped into his back again, “Ahh— mother fucker!" shouted Jake.

Spinning in place, Jake used his arms, sending out waves of water, as he tried to move everything away from him. The results were mixed, but with Jake's enthusiasm, he cleared out an area in the water around him.

Once he accepted that he wasn't going to get the bodies more than five feet from him—there was too much crap surrounding him that they kept forcing the bodies back towards Jake—he began to calm down a bit.

Like any sane person, he kept up the constant splashes of water, keeping the bodies away, but he calmed down enough to notice something.

More than one thing, but only one was really important.

The water he was in was genuinely comfortable, like a warm bathtub.

Jake had been to and swam in lakes and even the Pacific Ocean once. The lakes were fine depending on the season, but the ocean sucked.

There was no reason to go to a body of water if you were not going to enter said water. Only pricks and posers go to a beach to hang out and chat on the annoying sand.

Jake could understand there are a few beach sports that require sand. Women's beach volleyball was his personal favorite.

But really, sitting on the beach sucked, it was hot, and sand got everywhere. Worst of all, the water was cold as shit. At least the ocean he went to was cold as shit.

If Jake wanted to splash around in some ice-melt, he could go to some mountain river in early spring, not drive a couple hundred miles to sit next to cold water and stinking air smelling of rotten fish, rotten weeds, and salt. How is that nice in any way?

This water, though, would have been worth a trip. It was rather nice to float in. If there weren't dozens of bodies around him, Jake could imagine staying here a while.

A bell rang out, followed by a voice a moment later, "we got a live one on the starboard side! Swing around so I can throw a line."

Brushing aside a piece of wood as he turned, Jake saw a wooden ship beginning to slowly turn towards him. The shouts of men and women washed out over the water.

Pausing for a moment in his splashing, Jake tried to lift himself out of the water and look around. His stomach twinged as he focused on the only nearby land mass, and he could see the shore like he was standing on the shore looking up the beach.

He had never seen such devastation.

It wasn't even what was in the water. Everything there blended together into something Jake didn't want to see or catalog. The devastation he was focused on was solely on the far-off landmass.

The shoreline going miles inland on the landmass, and as far as he could see in either direction, were crushed.

That was the only way to describe it.

The hand of God came down and smote the land outside of a massive wall.

A line of stone, wood, and bodies was amassed at the base of the stone wall guarding the inner island. He thought he saw a ship or two lumped within the wreckage at the base of the walls.

The walls looked like they were a hundred feet tall and still mostly intact, but gaping cracks were running down its surface in places.

The broken segments give a look into the ravaged city that is sheltered behind the walls. The destruction inside was not nearly as bad as outside the walls, but it could in no way be called good from what Jake could see.

People crawling over the wreckage on the outside and past the holes in the wall.

Some appeared frantic as they darted one way then the other, throwing wood and stone behind them. Most, though, had the listless plodding of those who had given up all hope and needed to complete the horrible task before them so they could move on with their lives.

Settling back into the water as he slowed down the movement of his feet, he didn't want to look around, to see.

As he looked at the partially destroyed city, he knew what had happened. He remembered enough to guess. Did I do this?

The fire building up around his body as he fell towards the water. He felt nothing at the time or when he struck the water burning his way into the water's depths. He was numb to everything, and sure he would die.

He did not know how he was alive now… Or why h—

A thick rope splashed into the water, splashing him in the face and making him flinch back.

"Grab the rope, and we'll pull ya aboard." Yelled a man.

Taking hold, Jake felt the tug of the rope spin him around and then through the carnage-filled water. He closed his eyes, not wanting to see what he was passing through.

His eyes popped open the first time he felt something soft bounce off his outstretched arms. He could not keep them shut any longer. As he glided through the water, he passed one body after another.

Their faces burning themselves into his mind.

Jake dumped against the ship's hull and looked up at the man pulling the rope.

"Ahoy! Can ya hold on to the rope, or do I need to come down there to tie it around ya?"

Jake looked at the unshaven man for a second, taking in his weathered and rather ragged appearance. It was the first human he had had a conversation with in… too long.

Jake wasn't a particularly social person, but he enjoyed the occasional conversation. It had been too long since his last conversation with a human.

Shaking his head, Jake stuttered, " Uhh— ya? Ya, I can hold the line."

Squinted at Jake, the young man had a strange look on his face as he replied, "Hold on tight then."

Jake was barely razed out of the water before the robe slipped through his finger, and he fell back to the water's embrace.

Looking at his hands in shock, Jake noticed for the first time how pruney his skin was and how weak his hands felt. How weak his body felt.

The young man above him started laughing while Jake was still looking at his hands. "Haha~ seeing that face is… Aww, anyway… Floating in the water all night and half the day takes it out of ya. Not surprising ya're so weak."

Beginning to look back up at the end of his words, only to see the feet of the man falling towards him. Letting out a shout of surprise, Jake tried to move back.

"Lookout bellow~!" shouted the young man as he splashed into the water inches from Jake.

Wiping the water from his face with his free hand, Jake saw the man pop out of the water with a broad smile on his face.

Pulling the rope from Jake's hand, he began collecting the slack and tiring it under Jake's arms.

"Here we go, ah quick knot, and we're all set. Hey, Kel! Toss me a line, will ya, and pull us up!"

Before Jake even had time to look up, a coil of rope fell onto the man pushing him into the water as Jake was starting to be yanked up.

"Pull ya self up, lazy sack of shit!" Shouted a feminine voice in response before muttering, "making me do your jobs every chance ya get…"

Hearing a chuckle, Jake turned his head from staring up at the rope passing over the railing to find the dripping man casually keeping pace beside him.

"Names Wel, but my friends call me Walk. Comes from people telling me Wel walk on out of here then." The young man laughed at his joke, throwing his head back as he stuck his arm out to shake Jake's hand.

He rasped, slowly reaching out to shake hands. Jake was surprised by the grip that clamped down, not Wel's grip, but his.

Wel was casually crushing his hand. Jake couldn't even call his grip firm, a wet noodle was a better description.

It was like—

"No one calls him that." said the same flat woman's voice as before, "If we call him anything, it's Slacker. Or Slapdick. Getting him to do work is a job in itself. And I don't get paid enough for it…"

"Kel, how could you say suck things in front of our new friends! You'll ruin the reputation I'm buildin'!"

"Any reputation you build will collapse once they pay attention to you. Here take my hand." She finished talking to Jake, reaching out to him.

Reaching his hand out, she clasped his forearm, lifting him about the railing like it was nothing.

An older man walked over, looking Jake over, and Kel and Wil straightened their backs, stepping away slightly, coiling the ropes they used, and leaving Jake to wobble before he grabbed the railing. "Damn, you sure took a beating, didn't cha." The old man said in a deep voice.

Looking down at his body, Jake was surprised to find his bark pants more like bark shorts, and his leaf shirt was gone entirely. What was more concerning was that the entire left side of his body was a shade of black and blue. And covered in minor cuts and scrapes.

The most startling thing he realized was he was not covered in fur, his hand were not claws, and he was no longer more dog than man in appearance.

Strange that he was expecting to be a werewolf, considering he spent most of his life as a human… Why was I expecting to be—

"It's good you're alive, son, and we could save you… At least we could do something good on this… terrible day." The older man said, looking out over the water.

Jake followed his gaze and felt his gut drop out from under him. Tens of thousands—if not more—bodies surrounded them. In every direction he looked, they bobbed upon the water's surface until they touched the horizon. There have to be millions.

Jake had never imagined seeing a sight like this, and he wanted to forget seeing this one.

"What happened?" Jake rasped out the question, but he could probably guess.

"No one knows, or no one who knows is saying… From what we heard, a ball of fire came falling out of the east, crashing into the Basin. It sent a titanic surge of water towards the Shaft." The man shrugged as if saying what could one do.

"No one was expecting it and…" The older man waved around him as he finished speaking. It was enough. The results were plain for all to see. The old man was apparently done talking as he wandered off shouting at sailors.

Looking around at the devastation, Jake's eyes finally settled on the black stone tower sticking up in the island's center.

Wel sauntered up, handing Jake a towel with some food as he followed Jake's gaze. Wel grunted in disgust and derision as he looked at the pristine black tower standing tall undamaged, "Fucking whores!" Hissed out Wel, "They don't give a shit about any of this. Nothing more than how it affects their bottom line. The first thing the bitches did was to start repairing the docks. Who cares about the wounded and homeless?"

"Wel!" Snapped Kel, giving Jake a sideways look, "don't disrespect the Violet Clan. If not for them, the city would have been destroyed."

"Yeah, we all saw the magic walls. But if they were up sooner, all of the—

Kel interrupted Wel by poking him in the chest, making him take a step back.

"This isn't the place or time! Everyone lost someone and is grieving. So shut the fuck up and work without talking for once."

"They only see us as food." Muttered Wel as Kel stepped away, with a look of impotent rage on his face.

It wasn't quite enough because Kel responded, "Maybe, by they have the power to stop a hundred-foot wave, and we're sailors."

Jake wasn't really paying attention to the conversation. He was scarfing down the food that was brought to him. The thin bread was nigh unchewable and the jerky not much better, but it shut up his rumbling stomach.

Swallowing a mouth full of the food, Jake paused. The food felt hollow to him. It was weird.

"So," said Wel, interrupting Jake's inspection of the food, "never asked you, what's your name?"

Going to speak, Jake found his throat was dry, and all that came out was a croak. "Jaahh~."

Laughing at him, Wel threw over a cantine.

Taking a sip of the refreshing water, Jake nodded in thanks, then spoke, "Thanks, I'm Jake. Jake Reed." Letting the silence linger for a moment as other sailors moved around him before asking, "How many have you…" Jake waved to the water, lamely finishing, “…fished out…"

Wel's easy-going smile twisted slightly to become forced as he replied. "Few dozen. Most of those were in the morning and are resting below. Honestly, we were on our way back, having given up on finding more, when I spotted ya. Guess ya’re lucky, huh." Wel Gestured out to sea and the mass of dead. "Most of the other ships docked at the West Dock didn't even bring out their ships to look. Cowards were afraid of damage to their hulls. We're only out here because of the Young Miss." he gestured to the back of the ship by the helm to a young woman standing straight back, hands clasped at her waist, looking blankly at the devastation around her.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

She was beautiful. Her hair was black, and her eyes were a light bright green and popped out of her pale ivory skin. Her facial features were sharp, and she had a small nose that twitched occasionally.

Her clothes looked like a traditional Chinese dress with wide sleeves and a tight hugging top that lay over a loose skirt that began slightly above the waistline marked by a sash. The shirt was white with a dark blue at the edges and cuffs with a black fox leaping across the shirt. The skirt going from light to dark blue as it fell.

Jake had never actually seen people wearing such clothing before, but he recognized it from the manga he had read.

Eyes falling away as she turned towards him, Jake looked back at Wel, who was giving him a knowing look.

"Quite the sight to see, huh?" He asked, nudging Jake in the ribs, and he leaned back on the railing, looking over the deck.

Jake grunted as he breathed in, scenting the air for her. A twinge ran through his gut at the—surprising—instinctual reaction when he wanted to know more about her.

As he breathed in, he was flooded with the scent of rotting bodies in the water. Under that, Jake began picking out the smell of the scruffy unwashed bodies of the sailors working around him. Faintly, Jake picked out the scent of citrus, but hiding beneath it was…

"Who are you." Said a husky voice, startling Jake and making him jump and turn.

He was almost within arms reach of the woman he had been trying to… smell. Probably shouldn't smell people often… Or tell her that.

Jake was surprised such a voice was coming out of the young woman. While he wouldn't call her weak, she was on the slender side even with her five-and-a-half-foot-tall frame.

Seeing Wel give the woman a bow as he replied, Jake nodded his head, still eating.

"This is Jake Reed, the one we just pulled out of the Basin, Young Mistress."

The woman gave Jake a once-over before nodding slightly before walking away, giving a sniff with her nose in the air.

If Jake wasn't watching her slowly walk away, he wouldn't have noticed the slight twitch of her eyes towards him in surprise.

Any thought on what her eyes snapped to him left him as she passed. Jake was more entranced watching her go than when he first saw her. Naturally, his eyes dropped to her backside as she left, and he could not believe what he saw.

"Damn, ya are a bold one," Wel said while throwing an arm over his shoulders and turning him to the back of the ship, "never let someone tell you differently. Maybe too bold if you ask me, but it ain't my life, so let's get you somewhere out of the wait while we head back to the docks."

"What?" Jake asked, confused.

"Hun?" Said Wel looking at Jake before realization came into his eyes, "Ah, maybe that wave did more to you than giving you a bruise, eh? A knock to the head, maybe. You know where we are?" asked Wel while examining Jake's head.

Jake opened his mouth to reply that he was fine. Other than feeling hungry and somewhat empty inside, he closed it without saying anything.

Thanks to this rather chatty and assuming man, Jake had an opportunity, one he probably wouldn't have thought of because of how scattered his thoughts currently were. He could pretend to have amnesia.

It wouldn't be all that hard. From what little he had seen, the world looked… medieval, as far as technology went. He had no idea where he was, and that very attractive woman Wel called Young Mistress had a tail. So he could easily appear like everything was new to him.

If he was to judge the tail based on its appearance, he would call it a fox tail. It looked super fluffy and soft, and Jake could feel his hands itching to stroke it. And his face wanted to rub against it.

Jake didn't do any of that.

He had to make the assumption that grabbing the tail of someone was as bad as walking up to a woman and sticking your hand up her skirt or down her blouse.

Not something you could do without expecting to be punched in the face by a bystander after you were slapped by the woman a few times. And arrested.

Touching her tail would probably go along those lines.

Jake still wanted to run it through his hands. The image was stuck in his head.

"Ahh~ well, that sucks," Wel said, breaking Jake out of his thoughts. "Well, you look fine, and you are… mostly fine walking around. And now that I look…"

Wel trailed off as he inspected Jake, ending up focusing on his pants. "That's some high-quality clothes you have. Never actually seen anythin' like it. I can guess how you ended up clothed the way you are. And you do have a last name…"

"Uhh, that's all I can remember?" Jake asked/told Wel hoping that he would believe him.

Nodding his head like he was completing a puzzle, Wel said, “Yah… yah, that makes sense, though I can't ever remember hearing of a house called Reed. But then again, I only know of a hand full of people that have a house name. Never really paid attention to those types of people." Wel said, side-eyeing Jake, reappraising him.

Jake could only give a shrug of confusion at the look.

"Eh, whatever, you seem like a good sort for now. I'll show you where you can hang out till we dock." With that, Jake followed Wel across the ship, using the handrails to keep him upright.

A couple hours later, the ship finally made dock at a pier within a harbor packed with mostly damaged vessels.

The vessels that were unscathed from the disaster—those ships that were docked in the west harbor when the tidal wave came, according to Wel—had already left the harbor or were making their way through the path cleared through the wreckage.

Jake could see more damaged ships limping towards the port in search of someplace they could repair them.

Jake got a good view of the island during the trip to the West Harbor. It was mainly a stone wall with a black tower past it, with the wreckage of what was once outside, the walls scattered in piles on the miles of shore leading up to the walls.

And they passed another dock that was being built in what could have once been a harbor, but the area wasn't doing all that great.

It wasn't until they were more than halfway around the island that Jake started to see the structures that must have lined the entire outer ring of the island.

Shithole would be an apt description for most of what he saw. Rundown and neglected was the norm here.

Jake could see warehouses and tenement housing blocks that looked like they still had the same paint job as when they were first made. And the only reason he said they were ever painted at all was the few spots high up that had patches of white where there should be a gray-brown of old wood.

The people that lived in those places had more to worry about—like earning enough money to feed themselves—than putting on a fresh coat of paint.

When it came right down to it, Jake knew he was looking at the slums of this city. He couldn't imagine what living in worse would mean. Slavery whispered a part of his mind.

Like most slums, they were the first ones to suffer when shit went wrong, like a wave of destruction and death came. That I caused.

Jake didn't know how exactly everyone else within the main walls would suffer, but you can't destroy two-thirds of the slums, along with killing the inhabitants, without some impact on the elite.

Everyone on this island would suffer from this Jake-made disaster, and he would need to find a way to accept and live with that fact. And atone… if I can. But there was little drive behind the thought.

The only part of the outer city he had seen that would not require the descriptor 'rundown' somewhere in the sentence was the blocks around the docks and the main street that ran up to the city's gates.

Made sense all things said and done. If an island exists with this population level, it must be through trade.

Unless this city's nobility ran giant farms within those walls taking up nearly all of the space, the city would need a steady stream of trading vessels to support the population.

The idea of massive farms within the walls was absurd.

Jake could not think of important people actually doing manual labor willingly when they could just pay for it. As a cast, that would never happen. Individuals might, but they were the exception, not the rule.

It left Jake with one conclusion. The city was going to starve until trade returned to normal.

Which would be… Jake had no idea. Ships were complicated, and with many ships needing repair, a fast repair was not happening.

Jake did see small fishing boats out of the area filled with debris on the water—and some of the less damaged ships casting out large nets—but he did not believe it would be enough.

As the crew and the few dozen survivors placed below and at the back of the ship where he was, were readying themselves to disembark, Jake saw the Young Mistress speak to Wel.

Wel nodded his head a few times as she spoke before a smile broke out across his face, and he bowed deeply to her.

As he rose to his full height, the Young Mistress was already walking away. He looked around the crowd before locking eyes with Jake.

Smiling and making his way over, Wel motioned for Jake to follow him to the side of the crowd where they could talk.

Throwing his arm around Jake's shoulders, which caused Jake to flinch for a moment before relaxing, Wel began to speak, "I told the Young Mistress about your situation. She thought it over and decided that if ya wanted, ya could stay at our compound and work until ya get yar feet under ya. Hopefully, ya'll remember who you are, but if not, at least ya'll have some money and work, right?"

It only took Jake a second of thinking to come to a conclusion.

Nodding and smiling, Jake replied, "Yah, thanks for doing that. I would be happy to accept such an offer."

"Thought so," Wel said with a friendly smile, guiding Jake towards the crowd, making their way down the gangplank.

Jake made his decision for a few simple reasons, he had nowhere to sleep, he had nothing to eat, and he had no idea where he was or what the cultural norms of this place were.

In a city that was about to enter a time of food shortages and crisis, it was not a good time to be a homeless person or beggar.

Jake didn't know or care about the reasons the Young Mistress had for her continued sideways glances and hanging around him downwind. She would eventually approach him for what she wanted, and until then, Jake would learn what he could.

And if she had something more… nefarious in mind, Jake would deserve it. His heart was already weighing him down with the growing guilt. Anything would be worth lessening it.

**********

Katherine blinked her eyes, trying to get the grit out of them. It didn't work. She needed some water in them.

She would use her hands again, but experience taught her that with how dirty they were, at best, it would restart the issue she was having. Maybe it will work this time. She thought to herself. No! I won't rub my eyes. I won’t… Dammit!

"Ugh~" she groaned out, looking at her traitorous hand that rubbed more dirt in her eyes when she was distracted from walking. Smacking the bad hand and glaring at it for a few seconds, Katherine breathed deeply, trying to collect herself.

Sighing, Katherine looked around. Turning, she limped down what might have been a street heading towards the still mostly standing buildings off in the distance.

She had always been a quick healer.

A broken arm after falling off the tall wall she was trying to run along? Two weeks later, she was healed.

A good night's rest was enough for most of her scrapes and bruises to disappear. Even when her mother was training her to fight and beat her black and blue every day, as long as she had a good meal, she would wake up like nothing had happened.

Katherine never realized how much she took her healing for granted until now. Her chest looked like a wagon ran into her, and her body itched and twinged in pain as she moved from all the half-healed cuts.

The bottom of her feet either had bruises covering most of their surface, a bunch of small cuts, or massive blisters.

She did not want to bend past the post-sized strip of bruise on her stomach to find out. It wasn't worth it.

Her feet hurt every step; that was all she needed to know. She was only moving now to get to more food and water. It called to her like a siren's song.

The nice ones that sing for money and not for food.

There had to be something she could get her hands on that would quench the thirst and hunger tormenting her.

It is one of the most annoying things in the world when you fall asleep with your nose clogged, and you wake up with your mouth all dry and filled in a slime made by all of the saliva that dried and coated your mouth during your sleep. And then you feel like you could drink a gallon or two of water to quench that burning thirst.

Katherine remembered it happening that one time she was really sick a few years ago that it happened to her.

That time had nothing on when she woke up today. It made it seem like she had a pleasant night's sleep in comparison.

Waking up in the warm waters of the Basin was not as comfortable as one would think. It might have been better during low tide when the water was fresh, but with the brackish water of high tide, she woke up more thirsty and hungry than she could ever remember.

She was also having her back scraped raw by the lapping water shifting her over the coarse sand. The water could only provide so much lubricant between her and the tiny rocks she lay on for however many hours it was until she woke up with the dawn.

And her shirt was ripped off. Or sanded off. It was gone all the same, but she kinda wanted to know what happened to it.

At least her knife was still there.

Then there was the ten min—a few seconds she screamed when she looked over and found the eyes of a dead man inches from her face. Only to lunge back and discover she was crawling along more bodies.

Needless to say, this was not the best wake-up experience she had had in her life.

Then she had to pull herself up and stumble across the rubble-strewn shore with the other zombies heading for the Fast Road.

Not real zombies… At least not yet… she thought, carefully stepping wide of a few corpses lying on each other on the side of the Fast Road. Natural zombies were rare. It was more often than not some mage raising the dead. Though with the amount of dead…

Picking up her wobbling pace a bit, she kept her hand close to her dagger and a closer eye on the bodies around her. More than she was already keeping on the living people around her.

Hand brushing against her shirt, Katherine smiled slightly. It was the only good thing, along with the shoes swinging around her neck, that came out of the situation.

Every girl liked new clothes and money. The one she took them off shouldn't mind. She was dead, so how could she care.

But if she becomes a zombie… I ain't giving it back. She can loot her own shit.

Katherine may or may not have headed directly for the Fast Road.

Who would judge her for taking some clothes and shoes when she had none? And if she snagged the occasional coin purse she saw lying around and buried under other stuff, well, she was helping out the economy.

Money lying around does no one any good. The only way to stimulate growth and prosperity was for money to flow.

If she learned anything growing up, it was how to appreciate money and all its uses.

"Ain't nothing that can't be done with the right amount of money. Or a sharp dagger." Whispered the ghost of her mother through her mind. It was her favorite saying, and she said it often. Most of the time, she said it while stroking the blade sheathed on Katherine's lower back. That was always kind of creepy.

Luckily, right after she got control of herself after she saw the dead and stumbled out of the brackish water, she came across something drinkable. It was a barrel of shitty ale.

She had to move some bricks, and it was only a small barrel that didn't last long, but it was all she needed to search the area for… economic rejuvenation supplies.

It was painful, but today was the most profitable day she had ever had.

She put the silver coins in the shoes around her neck and the copper coins in the pouches hidden around her body, the most obvious at her waist—which, of course, held the least.

When other individuals came skulking about in search of the bounty the destruction of the wave could offer, Katherine scampered off. She was not in good enough condition to fight or flee from them, and she picked all of the easy fruit, so it was not worth it for her to stay.

As she stumbled along, she saw more and more people, most of which were trudging past her. They were walking in groups, and most had clothes around their faces with gloves and covering clothing.

The bulky individuals looked grim as they trudged forward with a supervisor at their head.

Closer to the standing structure, Katherine could see similar groups gathering bodies and stacking them in carts. Others shifted their piles of debris, sorting the materials they pulled out.

They had a lot of work to get through.

Slipping off the outermost Fast Road that looped around the island as she approached the still-standing buildings, Katherine began cutting through the back alleys.

This area was not her main stomping ground, but she made sure to familiarize herself with all of the docks around the island back when she was first thrown out.

You can't pick out the best location to work if you don't know what the different spots have to offer.

She didn't like West Harbor. There were as many spots she could hide here as elsewhere on the Docks. It was just… the area gave her the creeps.

She didn't know why. The longer she stayed on the west side, the more uncomfortable she grew.

That was in the past, though. Right now, the weight that gradually grew on her shoulders as she stayed here, like a giant monster was paying more attention to her as time passed, was nowhere to be felt. She could guess the reason.

The alleys were the cleanest she had ever seen them. The perpetual broken wooden crates, broken carts, trash, and random odds and ends that used to fill the alleys were nowhere to be seen.

Instead, people had moved out the trash and taken their places. Row after row of wounded individuals lay on tattered blankets or bundles of clothing.

Most had a blank look as they stared at the sky or a face twisted in the guise of unaccepted horror. They could not accept what their lives had become.

Katherine could not help a twinge of pleasure at seeing their plight.

They thought so much of themselves, lording their shitty ramshackle homes over her head. Everyone knew who she was when they saw her hair, and they hated her.

The rumors of her had spread through the entire Docks. Gossip was a form of currency here, and word of the fallen noble was juicy gossip, and as such, it spread like wildfire.

Treating her less than a dog must have fed their self-esteem in some twisted way. Spitting on her and dumping their waste must have made them feel real proud of themselves.

She would not stoop to their level.

"Ahh! You little bitch!" Snarled a man as he clutched his leg wrapped in a blood-soaked rage.

He leaned forward, his face twisted in rage, only to fall back as she flashed her blade at the man.

She remembered him. Her arm twinged in pain from when he broke. Her hair must have shone through when she asked him for coins, and he decided to beat her for begging. It was back in the beginning before she learned to survive.

There, she treated him better, no broken limbs at all. Turning to leave, she accidentally hit his leg again, causing him to scream in pain.

Her mouth stretched in a grin.

Or a snarl.

Teeth were shone, and her face was twisted in something like a smile. But who could say what it really was.

All around her were sheep. Marks, and it was her time to shine.

Plenty of people who would follow anyone able to lead them. And gaps needed to be filled in the wake of the destruction.

"Like mother always said, 'Ain't nothing that can't be done with the right amount of money. Or a sharp dagger.'" She whispered to herself, caressing her dagger and pouch of coins with both hands.