The taste of salt was absolute. It coated Malphas’s tongue, burned his eyes, and clung to the back of his throat like a viscous sludge. He did not wake with a gasp, but with a slow, agonizing pull as if his soul were being dragged back through miles of cold, crushing currents.
"Breathe, you stubborn fool," a voice commanded.
It was Lyra. Her hands were pressing into his chest, rhythmic and desperate. Each push sent a shockwave of pain through his fractured ribs, but the sharp agony anchored him to the living world. He coughed, a violent, hacking sound that expelled brine from his lungs, and his vision flickered back into focus.
The harbor was a graveyard of broken stone. The Great Spire lay in a jagged heap, half-submerged in the swirling, dark water of the bay. The phantom fleet was
