Maris moves like a rope in a storm: loose, economical, always finding purchase. She wears a faded blue jacket whose cuffs are salted and stiff, sleeves rolled to reveal a lattice of fine scars and a tattooed map of the merchants' lanes she knows by heart. Her left ear is threaded with three mismatched silver hoops and a tiny carved shark tooth; her right forearm bears a pale band where a rope once burned her. Her hands are callused with a surprising delicacy when she handles small things. When standing still she tilts her head as if listening to a distant tide; when she laughs it is abrupt and wet, like a wave breaking against a hull. Unexpectedly, the inside of her jacket is lined with delicate embroidered moths — a keepsake from a lost lover — which makes her, at a distance, look both fierce and absurdly sentimental.