Chapter Text
For as long as she could remember, Pike Trickfoot had loved the sea. Not the distant, abstract way that the vacationers who came to the village did, dipping their toes in and retreating to their beach towels, shrieking with how adventurous they were; nor yet the bitter, jaded way the old maritimers did, scowling into their salt-soaked beards and bemoaning the ocean like they would a cruel mistress, half hatred half desperate longing. Pike loved the sea the way a forester would love a wolf, the way a charcoal burner loved a fire: with wonder, with respect, with a healthy touch of fear, and with nothing less than the wild wholeness of her heart.
Pike loved the sea. And for its part, the sea seemed, in its own way, to love her back. It was going on five years now she and Grog had lived in their small house on the shoreline, and while it was by no means easy, the fish they caught were plentiful enough to make a living on. The storms that rolled through did no permanent or undoable damage, and their small garden provided what they couldn’t buy or trade for. Grog and her friends in the village provided all the socializing she could want. It was a hard life, filled with hard work, but it was a good one, and Pike was glad of its familiar routine.
Until the day the woman washed ashore.
They were hauling in their latest catch when Pike spotted her. It had been a long day on the water, and despite the good number of fish, Pike was more than ready to be done and have a bath and curl up under a stupid number of blankets. Early spring, while technically warmer than winter, was still, in Grog’s words, “colder than a witch’s tit,” and even Pike’s many layers couldn’t keep the damp chill from seeping into her bones.
She was just turning to Grog to check that they’d hauled in the last of the catch when something caught her eye. There on the beach, perhaps a dozen yards from the dock where they were moored, was a bundle of orange. Pike squinted. They got all kinds of flotsam and debris washing ashore, and at first she thought it some kind of fabric. Without really meaning to, she found herself walking down the dock, away from Grog and the Guiding Bolt . A few feet closer, and she realized the orange wasn’t fabric at all.
It was hair.
“Grog!”
She ran, feet pounding against the wood of the dock and the sand of the shore, until she slammed to her knees next to the crumpled body. The body of a woman, she saw, hair fire-bright even waterlogged and tangled as it was. She was naked, curled around herself in a protective ball, her pale skin near white with cold. Pike realized, dimly, that she was beautiful.
Then instinct took over. A lifetime of caring for the injured and the ill let Pike’s hands move without thought. She pressed two fingers under the woman’s jaw, feeling for a pulse. She found it, weak and thready, and let out a breath she hadn’t realized she held. The woman was alive. And breathing, she saw now, shallow, unsteady breaths that left tiny wisps of mist hanging in the biting air.
Grog ran up and dropped down beside her, already pulling off his enormous fur-lined coat. “Who’s she?” he asked.
Pike shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said. She reached out and brushed thick strands of hair back from the woman’s face. She was young, no older than Pike herself, and at Pike’s touch she shifted, a small whimper escaping from her lips.
She shook her head again. “We need to get her warm,” she said, and Grog nodded. Together they were able to move the woman enough for Grog to wrap her in his coat. He lifted her in his arms easily, and she curled against his chest, unmoving except for the occasional shiver. “Come on,” Pike said, and they set off, quickly, for home.
“Home,” for Pike and Grog, was a small cottage a ways out from the nearest village. It was Wilhand’s first, and then Wilhand and Pike’s, and then Wilhand and Pike and Grog’s, and now, it belonged to them. It was small, two bedrooms, a washroom, an open kitchen and front room with large windows looking out on the seacliffs. They didn’t have much, Pike and Grog, but they didn’t need much, and what they had was much like they themselves: no frills or ornamentation, but solid. Built to last.
The front was the only room with a fireplace, so Pike told Grog to put their… guest? Discovery? Mystery woman? There and build up a fire while she gathered blankets. They didn’t have many, but between the layers and the fire, the woman began to warm after a few minutes. A few minutes after that, she stirred, shifting under the soft nest they’d built around her. Pike watched as her eyes fluttered, then snapped open. The woman sat bolt upright, the blankets falling away, leaving only Grog’s coat to preserve her modesty. She looked frantically around the room, chest heaving with panicked breaths.
“Whoa, whoa, it’s okay!” Pike said. She knelt in front of the woman, hands spread in a calming motion. “It’s okay, you’re safe.”
The woman stared at Pike. “Where am I?”
“You’re in my house. We found you.” The woman looked over Pike’s shoulder. Her eyes widened and she scrabbled back. Pike turned and saw Grog standing, a steaming mug in his hands. “It’s okay!” she said, turning back to the woman. “This is Grog, he lives here, too. He helped me bring you here.”
Slowly, Grog walked over and knelt down next to Pike. “Here,” he said, holding out the mug. Pike recognized the smell wafting out of it: Pawpaw Wilhand’s secret cocoa recipe. “Drink this. It’ll help with the cold.”
Warily, the woman leaned forward and plucked the mug from Grog’s hands. She curled around the warm clay, raising it to her lips for a sip.
Her eyes widened. “It’s sweet!” She took another drink, this one longer, her face lit up with almost childlike wonder.
“So, uh.” Grog shifted, settling in to sit on the floor, legs crossed. “What… what happened to you?”
“Grog!” Pike shoved him, to no discernable effect. “She doesn’t have to talk about it if she doesn’t want to.”
“No, it’s okay.” The woman set the mug down carefully and pulled Grog’s coat tighter around herself. “I was… with my family. A friend of mine, and I… He wanted to… There was something happening, that he thought was… Bad. Dangerous. We were going to check it out together, but…” She ducked her head, pulling her knees up to her chest. “We got separated. I don’t know what happened to him. And then I ended up… here, I guess.”
Pike frowned. “Do your family live nearby? Can we get in touch with them, let them know you’re alright?”
The woman shook her head. “No. They’re not…” She smiled, barely. “They’re not especially easy to find.”
Pike frowned harder. “Then… I don’t know, can we help you? We can get you some clothes, at least, something to eat, maybe a place to stay for a little while....” She trailed off, the enormity of her helplessness overwhelming her. “Do you need anything? I don’t-” She bit her lip. “I mean, I don’t even know your name -”
“Keyleth.”
Pike looked up. The woman’s chin rested on her knees, her copper-gold hair spilling around her shoulders. She smiled.
“My name is Keyleth.”