My elder brother, Landyn, was pronounced lost at sea and presumed dead when salvage was found of his ship along the coast. House Enturose, a minor noble house, owned a shipyard famous for their sleek, fast ships so unlike the typically larger ships built by the other Tirian shipwrights, and Landyn Enturose was the family’s big bid to move up in society with his devastatingly powerful new design.
I was a child. Landyn was my idol. More than ten years my senior and one of the youngest and most promising builders of the time, and my only brother. Sometimes he’d take me out on the waters in a little rowboat and talk with me about all sorts of things. He taught me how to ride a horse, read building drafts, keep a ledger, play darts, and...