OakleyShepard93

[DEVIATION] The harbor had never been so quiet. Even the gulls seemed to have abandoned the coastline that morning. A pale gray sky stretched over the sea, and a cold wind moved across the water, carrying the smell of salt and rain. Along the stone pier, hundreds of townspeople had gathered behind the guards' barricades. They had come to witness an execution. At the very end of the pier stood a wooden platform extending over the dark water. The condemned woman waited there alone. She was young, with short, pale-blond hair that moved gently in the wind. She wore a simple blue one-piece swimsuit with white trim, chosen because the execution required her to enter the sea. Her wrists were bound tightly behind her back with coarse rope. A white cloth had been tied across her mouth. She couldn't speak. Perhaps that was intentional. The authorities had already decided that there was nothing more they needed to hear from her. Her name was Elise Maren. Three days earlier, the