Page 64 of The Temptation of Roan Island

The quick change of subject gives me whiplash, but Shemaiah rarely talks about his parents, and I find myself curious to hear more.

“We were so different.” He chuckles. The sound bounces off the carriage walls and diffuses some of the tension. “She was more like Jafeth. She got antsy on the island. Loved a good party. And was fascinated by humans.”

I’m not sure why he’s telling me all this.

“But despite our differences, she loved me fiercely. She loved all her children and would do anything for us.” He looks back at me. “In that, you remind me a little of her. I think she would have loved you.”

That word—the one we both distrust—clings to the air like the scent of smoke on fabric. My breath stills, and everything slows. His tongue grazes his bottom lip, and his eyes flash black before returning to their normal color.

“She would have loved you,” he repeats.

And I wonder if he’s saying more than he’s saying or if I’m just reading into things.

“What happened to her?” I ask.

Shemaiah breaks eye contact and sighs. “She was here in New Essik alone. I’m not sure why. But some humans found out what she was, and they ganged up on her and killed her.”

“I’m sorry.” I reach across the aisle and put my hand on his knee.

“It’s okay. It was a long time ago.”

“I’m still sorry. I lost my mom when I was a teenager. The hurt never really goes away.”

Shemaiah makes a humming noise, then looks away.

I do the same. The New Essik Sanatorium looms into my view, surrounded by a thick wrought-iron gate. My throat tightens, mouth going dry. The yard is overgrown with dead grass and brambles, the windows dark, as if all the blinds are closed. Halfway between the gate and the main building, there’s a bench, shrouded in the shadow of an oak tree. I can almost feel the crack that runs down the middle. I spent too many days sitting on it, wondering how my son was doing and who was caring for him while I wilted under the doctors’ ministrations.

I lean back, my heartbeat jumping in my chest.

“What is it?” Shemaiah asks, as if he hears the change in my heart’s rhythm.

I tense, turn from the window, and close my eyes.

“Pippa?”

Strange memories—no, dreams—threaten my thoughts. Nightmares of blood and anesthetic. The weight of someone holding me down. White masks. Flickering lights. Chanting.

A tear slips from my eye and trails down my cheek to my jaw.

“Oh, sweet one.” Shemaiah cups my face, his thumb wiping my tears. “We should have taken another route. I didn’t think what it would do to you to see The Sanatorium again.”

He pulls me across the aisle and into his lap. Again. We’re magnets that can’t stay apart. His strength chases away the nightmares. His warmth banishes the ghosts that haunt me. I want to stay here forever, in his arms. If only I could.

27

PIPPA

“Ithought we were taking the carriage the whole way.” I glance over my shoulder at the man dressed in a blue uniform retrieving our luggage from the undercarriage.

“No.” Shemaiah follows my gaze, then faces forward, waiting for the next ticket window in the depot as a single man ahead of us finishes his purchase. “I’d rather we were… comfortable.”

I want to argue that the carriage was one of the most comfortable vehicles I’ve ever been in, but the words die when I look up at the metal and glass leviathan above us. I’ve never been in an airship before, having ridden the locomotive from New Caldon to New Essik.

The airship is shaped like an oblong bubble that gleams in the light when the sun reflects off the polished metal. Five parallel lines of porthole windows from one end of the airliner to the other tell me it’s massive inside.

The ship makes a loud guttural noise as someone shouts something from above. Men hang from ropes at the top. I can’t tell what they’re doing, but I imagine they’re checking to be sure everything is ready for travel. In the sky. Hundreds of feet above the ground.

The loudspeaker crackles, and a voice announces the time of the impending launch.