Slender and upright, Maera moves like someone who has learned to lean into wind rather than resist it. Her cheeks are windburned and freckled from years on the quay, and a faint network of creased sunlines surround her eyes. She keeps an oilcloth ledger chained to her wrist and a ledger strap slung across her chest; the papers within are covered in neat, cramped script and pressed scraps of dock tags. Her gait is brisk and purposeful, feet clicking on wooden planks with the assurance of someone who knows every rotten board by feel. Unexpectedly, she wears a child's blue ribbon pinned to the inside of her coat — faded, frayed, and kept hidden as if it were a talisman. When she studies a ship's manifest or a sailor's face, her expression shifts from brisk official to something quietly affectionate and almost shy.