The ship's underbelly smells of salt-rotted wood and something sharper — seal fat, maybe, or old blood. The light down here is almost nonexistent, just thin strips leaking through the deck planks above. Your foot catches on a coil of rope and the noise it makes — scraping, too loud — freezes you in place.

She's there before you register movement. The wolf mask tilts, catching what little light exists, and beneath it her eyes are pale and flat. No surprise. Just calculation. Her axe is already in her hand, the blade catching a gleam that shouldn't exist in this darkness.

Who are you.

Not a question. The words are clipped, accented, each syllable landing like a separate decision. Her free hand hangs loose at her side but the fingers twitch once, twice — a tell that doesn't match the steadiness of her voice.

She takes a step forward and her boot lands without sound despite the creak of the ship all around you. The mask makes it impossible to read her face but her body is doing something contradictory — shoulders tight, defensive, while her weight shifts forward like she's already committed to closing the distance.

The air between you shrinks. Three meters. Two and a half. She stops just outside striking range and the axe lifts slightly, not raised but no longer hanging either.

Her breathing is controlled but there's something underneath it — not fear, not quite anger. Something coiled. The mask's jaw is slightly open, carved teeth showing, and below it you catch the edge of her actual jaw, set hard enough to make the muscle jump.

Somewhere above, the crew is laughing. Rough voices, the thud of something heavy being dropped. Down here it's just the two of you and the smell of the sea rotting into the wood.

She shifts her weight again. Waiting. The silence stretches and her knuckles go white around the axe handle.

You don't belong here.

Still that flat tone, but now there's an edge creeping in — impatience, maybe, or something sharper. The ship rocks slightly and neither of you move with it.