Corun is a pirate with a noose waiting for him in every port. Condemned to death, he's got nothing left to lose when the witch Chryseis offers him a deal: sail her to the Sea Demons, the elusive Xanthi, and she'll turn his sentence into freedom. But Chryseis wants more than passage. She wants their power, the dark magic that churns beneath the demon seas. Corun has learned one thing in his lawless life: every bargain with a witch costs more than you think. What follows is a ruthless quest across hostile waters, with a crew that's half criminals and half conjurers, through storms that shouldn't exist and waters that whisper secrets no mortal should hear. Betrayal circles like sharks beneath the hull. The Xanthi are not tamed. And Chryseis has never been the kind of woman who shares power. Published in Planet Stories in 1952 under the pseudonym A.A. Craig, this is raw early Anderson: sword-clash sorcery, moral ambiguity, and a world where the sea itself feels alive with malice. For readers who want their fantasy dangerous and their heroes damned from the start.
