Skeleton Cove

Eleven-year-old Harper finds a glass bottle on the beach containing a hand-drawn pirate map. She and best friend Diego follow the cliffs to a hidden sea cave where Captain Redthorn buried stolen treasure 200 years ago — but someone else is already on the trail.

Harper loved the beach more than anywhere else in the world. Every morning before the tourists woke up, she walked the shoreline near her grandmother's cottage, collecting shells and sea glass and anything interesting the tide had dragged in overnight.

'Best time of day,' she whispered to herself, breathing in the salt air. The beach was hers at this hour — no umbrellas, no radios, just the gulls and the waves and whatever the ocean decided to leave behind.

This morning, something glinted between two rocks near the waterline. It was a glass bottle, dark green and crusted with barnacles, sealed with old wax. Inside, she could see a rolled-up piece of paper.

'No way.' Harper knelt down and turned the bottle in her hands. Her heart beat a little faster. 'This is not just beach junk. This is old.'