Stavanger Bay with the salt on our skin

The ghostly, inky-ribbed wolf emerged from the cresting waves like an apparition, his pelt bristling with salt and shaped into a variegated array of spines; a low chuff of greeting billowed within his heaving chest and burst from his parted jaws with a fine spray of brine as he approached his brother, his Chosen One, the slate-silver warhound, and Sharkbait. Throwing back his head with the wild abandon befitting such a momentous occasion, he, too, poured his voice into song — a deep, rumbling bass that threatened like thunder as he sidled up alongside his brother, ever wary of the snap of powerful jaws, to clasp the Leviathan’s chin and lower jaw lovingly in a brusque expression of devotion. Bemused by the scrappy witch doctor’s antics, Szymon followed her twisting and undulating form with ardent auriferous eyes, but his attention was drawn to the Leviathan. The swell of pride within his breast was in part due to the preparations for the ceremony, in which he had played an assistant’s role — surely the Sea would bless him, recognizing his fealty to Her will.