Dockchain Wight

The capstan clicked in the empty yard. Once, then a pause. Again. Its chain had been rusted solid for decades.

The Wight rose through the planks, broad as a dockhand with a face washed blank. Three black links pinned its jaw shut. Moorings left their cleats. Anchor chain climbed the seawall. Even the brass pull on my coat stretched toward its hands.

Saye ran. A wet loop formed around her shadow and tightened at the throat. Slowly, the Wight hauled us toward a number on a drowned piling. I broke the painted digit with a maul. The chain slackened. It looked at me with what seemed like exhausted gratitude.

It keeps to the old workplace and repeats its last assignment. Intruders are fastened to a location, an object, or a promise, then reeled back when they try to leave. Small habits remain: a knot tested, a hook straightened, a pause at a whistle nobody else hears.

Changing records in front of it can provoke violence. So can crossing a painted tally without acknowledgment. Honest work done safely is ignored. A victim's full name may stop it. A false one makes every loose chain strike.