1. Pippa
PIPPA
Hope is as dangerous as a boat in a storm.
All it takes is one catastrophic wave to capsize it.
As someone plagued by an illness that will carry me to my grave, I know better than anyone not to board that boat.
Yet here I stand, allowing hope to pull me forward, even as it takes on water and drags me down.
The dock at the back of the Roan Estate is empty today.
Frigid wind grasps the fabric of my green skirt like fingers trying to tug me closer to the icy depths.
The wood threatens me with its loud creaking, warning me how easily it could toss me into the cold water.
I brave the dock’s animosity as I watch Lake Nettor roll, swell, and surge, a tumult of vermilion foam, dark waters swallowing the angry horizon.
Any minute now, I’ll see the steaming craft traveling to Roan Island.
My son will be on that vessel, and we’ll finally re-unite.
That’s the one hope I stand on, refusing to let it sink.
So I don’t move. I balance precariously on the swaying wooden planks and watch, waiting just as I have ever since Shemaiah Roan told me he would send for my son.
The frozen forest behind me casts shadows that grow longer with each passing minute.
The gnarled and sharp shade lengthens like dark ghosts teasing the crimson water at the rocky shore.
A sense of foreboding settles in my aching bones.
What if the boat doesn’t come? What if Tobias isn’t on it?
It’s been two weeks since that fateful day when Shemaiah and Jafeth Roan appeared at The Sanatorium.
Though considering all that’s happened since then, it feels like a lifetime.
Now that I know more about what their chance entails—more than they even knew at the time they invited us here—I’m less inclined to think that anything good will come out of this.
I came to Roan Island grasping onto a fleeting belief that this place might be my salvation. I stayed because I wanted to believe it could be my son’s saving grace.
Now, I strain my ears listening for the clank of an engine, watching for the puff of steam, and the gleam of bright metal, hoping, hoping, hoping.
Instead of the hum and bustle of the machine, familiar laughter peals from behind me, a stark contrast to the cold. A song so full of life, I resent it. I wrap my shawl tighter, the freezing wind sizzling through the fabric like icy rocks against my skin.
Anna is the first to step onto the dock, making it shiver and sway. Kay is right behind her, keeping her eyes on the water as if it might amass and shift into a creature with teeth bent on snatching her into its depths.
“Have you seen Shemaiah?” Anna asks, joining me at the end of the dock.
A wave of dizziness blurs my vision, a reminder that I’m not invincible. Today—a bad day—my illness is like the storm pummeling Lake Nettor. To steady myself, I grab hold of the rod used to tie up the boats.
“I haven’t seen him,” I reply, turning back to face the water.
“But we saw him leave the house.” Kay’s head swivels, and her green eyes assess the landscape, as if I’m hiding him somewhere.
Her heavy gray cloak shrouds her lithe form, protecting her from the frigid temperature.
She has her hands shoved into the pockets and the hood up over her lovely red hair.
When she looks back at me, her pale cheeks are bitten pink by the wind. “You’re sure he didn’t walk this way?”
Shemaiah has been doing his best to avoid us for the past two weeks, which is understandable, considering how aggressive Anna and Kay have been in their pursuit of him and Jafeth.
They would probably pursue Zarah and Noah Roan, too, if the former wasn’t constantly roaming the grounds like a ghost, and the latter wasn’t happily married.
Not that I blame them for chasing after Shemaiah and Jafeth.
The two men—if they can be called men, given what they are—represent the only chance we have to overcome the illness that plagues us.
When they brought us here, it was under the orders of their father, a man who deemed human life disposable and human women more so. Every solstice he would bite women with poisonous venom, hoping it would transform them into Mavarri—creatures of myth and legend. It never worked.
Instead, the women died. So, his sons began recruiting women from The Sanatorium who were already facing impending death.
Their power and generous donations forced The Sanatorium to say yes to their requests.
With what little compassion they had, the Roans gave dying women a choice.
It wasn’t until our little group arrived that they learned the ceremony to transform humans would only work if the Mavarri and the human are in love.
“I haven’t seen him,” I repeat my previous words, but don’t add that I noticed he likes to take walks to the south of the house, particularly on days like today when the ground is clear of snow. I shouldn’t notice as much as I do about Shemaiah. Another sinking ship. “I’m not the man’s keeper.”
“What are you doing out here, then?” Anna tucks a strand of brown hair behind her ear, then adjusts her fur cap. She doesn’t look at me, glancing down at her leather gloves to check their fit before slipping them back into the fur muff.
I want to tell myself I don’t hear an underlying bite in her tone, but it’s getting harder to explain it away given the circumstances.
Her doll-like face belies it, however, as she smiles politely.
Her whiskey-colored eyes lift, and she tilts her head as she watches me, her dark hair sliding over the fuzzy cape fastened with a citrine clasp at her throat.
“I’m waiting for the boat,” I reply. “Mrs. Darning said it would be back today.”
“Is your son supposed to be on it?” Kay looks once more at the water and shudders. “It might be hard to fall in love if your attention is divided.”
Love. That’s a word from another time. Even now, when love might be our only chance at survival, I can’t bring myself to hope for that. It’s too much to ask for.
Anna shrugs. “It’ll just make it easier for us to find time alone with the Roan brothers if she’s off tending a child.”
And there it is. The reminder that it’s every woman for herself out here on Roan Island.
Sighing, I focus on the dark gray horizon, cut by rolling red and white water, and tell them once more what I’ve told them before.
“I’m not interested in competing with you for Shemaiah’s or Jafeth’s attention.
I just want to spend my remaining days with my son. ”
Away from The Sanatorium.
Anna snorts.
I don’t respond, knowing she doesn’t mean to be petty and divisive. She’s scared and trying to survive. I can’t and won’t fault her for that. But when it comes to my son, I’ll do anything to to be reunited with him, and I won’t let anyone get in my way.