It is simply a metaphor
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From: An Exceptional Story: A Devil's Due
The sea was 'wine-faced', not wine-coloured. It was drunk – that is to say, choppy.
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The angry scholar slumps.[…]"See? Nobody believes your theory about irrigo leaching through the stones."[…]it escalates to personal barbs ("did selling your soul make you daft?"). In the ensuing fistfight[…]one of their hefty books goes flying.[…]you[…]snatch it[…].
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