The Salted Bride

Nechtan has never been worth much to the Salt Coast. Her village is poor, the tides are owned by a merchant house, and every girl turning eighteen is salted — claimed by ritual, sold by contract. When the house's enforcer comes for her cousin, Nechtan goes in her place. No ceremony. No choice. A cart, a buyer in the capital, and a man named Onnig who has delivered five brides before her and salted every one. They lose the road and spend a month in a smuggler's cove, pretending to be husband and wife so the coastal patrol will leave them alone. He is the man who salts brides. She is the woman stealing his ledgers. Somewhere between the pretending and the truth, the sea decides which of them owes what — and Nechtan intends to collect.