7. Pippi
“Welcome to Niverwick Isle! Where magic, monsters, and marvel await!”
That welcome spiel was spoken by a cat.
As I shuffled with the other tourists down a long, bedraggled dock, I swore the bouts of repeated vomiting had done me in.
Rendered me so dehydrated, so woozy, that I’d seen the bell-shaped cat shadow at the end of the dock and had a random blip of a thought ( That is the cutest pudge cat I’ve ever seen.
And it’s waiting for us. Maybe that’s the guest services attendant Caleb said would meet us.) that my brain tried to turn into reality.
Cats didn’t talk. Not even on magic islands. Right?
Fog curled lazily around us, forming a thick, smoggy veil that was almost impossible to see through.
The people at the front of our group, a mere six or so feet away, had turned into hazy smudge blobs, and there seemed to be nothing beyond the eroded surface of the dock—nothing but a wall of white, broken only by the little bell-shaped shadow.
My fingers dug into Jackson’s arm when the warped planks of wood grumbled beneath our feet.
“I trust you’ve had a pleasant trip?” The cat’s shadow moved, its head following our trek across the dock.
“Babe.” Jackson’s breath danced over my ear. “Did that cat just talk?”
“Oh good,” I whispered back. “You heard that too?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Thank the stars. I thought I was losing it.”
The novelty of the talking cat didn’t sink in for most folks, though.
Not right away, at least. Some were so deep in conversations, they likely hadn’t heard the welcome statement.
And others were probably expecting to find a person lurking behind the veil of smog.
But then the first cluster of people reached the end of the dock, and their whispered titters wove their way back to us.
“Aw, it’s a cat!”
“It’s talking?”
“Well, he’s a magical cat. Obviously.”
Waves belted the bottom of the dock, making the wood rasp in protest. I shivered when icy water flecked under the hems of my jeans and bit back the urge to cry in relief when the swirling curtains of fog thinned, revealing the craggy surface of the island.
The cat blinked at Jackson and me as we stepped off the dock and joined the group of people queuing around a dinky, pockmarked sign that read, “Welcome to Niverwick Isle! Please wait for an attendant.”
“Welcome,” the cat drawled.
He was a long and lanky orange tabby. A real handsome feller too, sitting all proud and tall, with his little pouchy cat belly sploshed over his feet. His wide, bottle-green eyes were sweet and innocent looking, and almost too big for his face.
“Oh, my!” A woman behind me cooed, excitement boinging off her as she shuffled flush against my back, peering over my shoulder at the cat. “How precious. I can’t! Oh my goodness, I cannot .”
“Don’t know that I’d call it precious , Melany. It’s a little creepy,” another woman muttered.
“Pft, don’t be silly, love,” Melany trilled. “He’s a treasure .”
I had to smile.
The woman behind me smelled crisp and fresh—like the perfume counter at a high-end department store.
All those fragrances that were decadent and sharp and rich and very, very, very expensive.
And Melany looked the expensive and sophisticated sort.
She was older, in her late-sixties, maybe early-seventies.
Although I would never presume that a sophisticated dame, such as herself, would fall on the older end of the scale.
So, I’d guess her age was around sixty. She was dressed to the nines in a cleanly pressed long skirt, which fluttered down to her booted ankles, a form-fitted suit jacket, and an elegant black coat.
A neat plait of silvery hair twined over her left shoulder.
And here she was, this elegant woman, all hunched up against my back, probably getting some good whiffs of my sweat-rank skin and vomit breath.
But she smiled at me when she noticed I’d turned to look at her.
A big, white-toothed grin that wrinkled the skin around her mouth and temple—skin untouched by either the chemicals the Standies often turned to or the cosmetic magic the Sorcerers could wield.
Her sophisticated beauty was au naturel .
“Don’t you just wanna march over there and give the cat a good smooshing?” I said to Melany, being mindful to keep my foul breath aimed away from her face.
“Yes.” She gave my shoulder a giddy swat.
And I immediately decided I liked her. A lot.
Some people just gave off good vibes. Happy vibes.
“You are not smooshing that cat,” Jackson hissed in my ear.
I stood on my tiptoes and nuzzled his neck, peppering little kisses there.
“I wonder if it’s actually the cat talking, or if a Sorcerer is throwing his voice,” Melany pondered out loud to her partner. “Remember when we went to that safari thing? And that handsome Sorcerer boy was doing voices for all the creatures. You were ready to scoop up that little raccoon.”
Her partner sniffed and ran her hand down the front of her slate grey trousers.
She looked a few years younger than Melany and had a softer kind of suave to her.
From the artfully untidy bob of chocolate-and-grey-specked hair that brushed her cheeks, to the crooked smile she threw at Melany, down to the simple, but well-fitted trousers and peacoat she wore. “The racoon was cute?—”
“So is this cat.”
“— ter . Cu ter than the cat.”
Melany gave an overdramatic gasp. “That’s it, love. We need to divorce. To say a racoon is cuter than this precious angel,” she tutted. Warmly. Jokingly.
The other woman gave a harrumph that might’ve sounded stiff and snotty, if it wasn’t so basked in love and affection.
And I officially liked both of them.
“This your first time on the island?” I angled myself to face them.
“Babe.” Jackson pinched my arm.
“Yes.” Melany beamed at me. “It’s so exciting, isn’t it?”
Not the word I’d use. But… “Sure is,” I said.
“It’s our first time as well, and Jackson’s been telling me there are some other creatures here.
I thought it was just the Loch Ness Monster…
but I sometimes live under a rock.” Truthfully, I hadn’t been interested enough to dig into everything the island offered.
“Is there anything you’re really eager to see? ”
“Babe, c’mon.” Jackson hefted our backpack a little more firmly onto his shoulders and twined an arm around my waist, pulling my back against his chest. “You don’t have to chat with everyone in line.”
“It’s just a little casual conversation,” I said.
At the same time, Melany responded, laughing, “At the moment, I’m obsessed with this cat. But if you ask me again in fifteen minutes, I’ll give you a different answer.”
“And you’ll get a different answer fifteen minutes after that.” Her partner chuckled.
“Right!” the cat chirped again, making several people squeal and giggle. “If I could have your attention for a moment?—”
Melany bounced. “ Oooooh , look at its little mouth moving!”
“—so I can make sure everyone hears me.” The cat stood, dropped into a long, languid stretch, and meandered closer to us, his little paws padding silently over the rocky surface.
Jackson stiffened against me and hissed sharply through his teeth.
“Zohar didn’t tell you about the cat?” I whispered.
Jackson sniffled. “No.”
“Oh no. He should’ve , considering?—”
“He doesn’t know I’m allergic,” Jackson cut me off.
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
Jackson, you see, had some whopping allergies. Cats made him sneeze and break out in hives. So did dogs. Anything with dander, really.It was why we didn’t have any pets.
I had a bunny when we started dating. Good ole Roger (like Roger Rabbit, get it?).
He was such a friendly, happy little floof, and I’d given him free roam of my one-bedroom apartment, which meant Jackson hadn’t been able to come over to my place.
He’d start sneezing his head off as soon as he walked in the door.
Thankfully, Jessa had been able to take Roger when Jackson and I’d gotten the house together.If she hadn’t…
I mean, I would’ve kept him. For sure. My heart wouldn’t have handled surrendering him to a shelter. But poor Jackson would’ve suffered for it.
I twisted my head and gave Jackson a peck on the cheek, careful not to blast my foul breath over his face. “Your antihistamines are in the medicine pouch,” I said. “I wasn’t thinking we’d have a cat attendant, but y’know, I packed everything. Just in case.”
“What would I do without you?” Jackson turned his lips to my forehead.
“Live in misery, I suppose.”
“Quiet, please.” The cat’s tiger-striped tail flicked as he circled our group.
“Sorry,” I mumbled during one of his rotations.
The cat stopped, fixed me with a look that almost screamed, “don’t talk to me, peasant,” and carried on with his announcements.
“Your bags are already being transported to your rooms. I know you were told to leave them behind, and for many that is a cause for concern. Rest assured, your belongings are well cared for and are waiting for you.”
“The cats dragged them in, eh?” a man at the front of the group boomed.
“Hoo-hoo, that’s incentive not to be a dick to the staff, eh, Chapman?” someone else crowed. “You might find a hairball in your boxers.”
“Ugh,” a woman grunted. “I do not want a cat touching my stuff. Do I have to pay extra for a human?”
“That’ll be another $2K,” a man chortled. “For the privilege of having your belongings be hair free.”
“I”—the tip of the cat’s tail gave us a haughty wave—“am merely your guide. Rest assured, travelers, there is an abundance of human employees on this isle . It is not run by cats.”
“How amazing would that be if it was run by cats, though?” I whispered to Jackson. “If our rooms were in these big cat trees, and we slept in these giant, poofy cat beds. The food might not be so great. All seafood all the time, probably. But they’d have things like cat yoga and laser tag and?—”
“Babe, pump the brakes on that imagination train.” Jackson shuddered. “That’s a nightmare.”