The captain looked at the money and then at his ship out in the ocean.
There was no way he could spend that gold.
They'd eat him. End of story.
Then a stack of crates shifted, and one toppled over and fell into the water without anyone moving to catch it.
There was another tremor. This one wasn't so easily ignored.
The captain kept to his feet from the shudder that was underneath them.
The tremor rolled through the land, like something enormous in the earth was turning over in its sleep.
Some of his crew struggled to stand, holding onto a post or railing to keep steady.
He looked at the man and the woman. Neither of them had moved or reached for anything.
Their eyes had gone to the treeline where the captain imagined they came from.
Then there was a light.
It appeared above them, rising up and further into the sky.
At first it was barely there, but it became more distinct.
It was a strange thing; a point of light climbing into the dark sky, too steady to be fire, and too bright to be a torch, but it was far too purposeful to be anything natural.
It was moving, toward them.
The monstrous man-eater, the one he knew, made a sound.
The captain looked at him and saw something he had not expected to see on the face of a thing like that.
He had seen it often enough.
Not fear exactly, but the thing that lives just before fear arrives, the moment of recognition when the body understands something the mind hasn't finished processing yet. His wings spread slightly, involuntarily, like he was preparing to flee.
The dock workers had stopped entirely. They stood where they were and watched the light grow larger and said nothing, which the captain thought was the most honest response available.
His own men were the same.
The captain watched it come and felt a calm settle over him that he recognized from other moments in other places.
The particular calm of a man who has made his peace. He had cheated death more times than he could honestly account for, in waters that had no business letting him through, in situations that should have ended differently.
He was not a man who expected luck to hold forever.
But still, it would have been nice to get out of this alive somehow.
He had a good run, he thought.
He straightened up.
He should greet his end with some dignity.
The light was close enough now to form into a shape, and the shape was a person, and the person was moving with a speed and certainty that left no doubt about what they were or where they were going.
He knew that shape.
The captain let out a breath that had apparently been waiting some time to leave.