Fog had already laid a gray blanket over Kelpbone Steps, softening the harbor’s sharp edges and blurring the black stone stairs into one another. Mira stood on a damp landing with her yellow oilskin coat shining like a little lantern in the mist. Below her, skiffs rocked against the floating docks, but most of them were only shapes now.
She held both hands up and made the quick shore sign for caution, the one adults used when a boat needed to keep still. Tobin, standing a few steps higher with his striped cap pulled low, tried the same sign again, slower this time. His rope-marked hands cut pale shapes in the fog. Far out, a small skiff drifted where the water vanished into white.
No answer came back.
Mira tried cupping her hands around her mouth and calling, but the fog swallowed the sound before it reached the skiff. Even Tobin’s big voice bounced back to shore like it had hit a wall.
“The wind took them too far,” Tobin said, trying to sound steady.
Mira stared at the blank white where the skiff should have been. The usual shore signals were useless now, and the skiff was already out of easy calling distance. If nobody could see or hear the warning, the little boat would keep drifting farther into the harbor.
Mira looked down the wet steps, then out over the water, thinking fast. She could stay here and keep waving into the fog. Or she could try something else, something the skiff might actually notice.
What happens next?
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