Chapter Fifty-Four

ANDA

So pretty, this thing I’ve composed.

The boat is clawing its way up the steep waves and crashing over them. I’ve crossed impossible lengths, and its shuddering hull is within my sight. Soon, it will be within my reach. The captain has good control, but he’s sweating profusely under his uniform. I smell his fear—sour and rank. It inflames me.

The rest of the passengers are holding on, waiting for the storm to abate. Under the surface, I open my eyes and take in the murky, churning water around me. The silt and stones of the lake bottom pelt my skin. They’re fawning, and I kick them away. They’ll never persuade me to be kinder.

I raise my hands a little and incite the wind, whipping the waves to twenty feet.

Twenty-five.

Thirty.

The captain is well seasoned, navigating the steep swells to let the ship’s reinforced bow take all the brutal force of each eager wave. The boat is sturdy and will take the punishment according to the physics of its creation. She has good bones. It will be lovely to bite into them and spit them out.

But—this won’t do. It’s taking too long. From the depths of the lake, I hear a calling.

Don’t be greedy. Share, my dear.

Others are hungry to partake in the coming feast. I hold up three fingers on my right hand, swirling them slowly above me, inviting the Three Sisters to rally forth. Rarely released but just as voracious, they had their turn in my place before evolving into a legend.

The three rogue waves travel one after the other; impossibly large, even within such a terrible November storm. People speak reverently of them. They’ve taken other ships before, far larger. My sisters are ravenous like me but cannot come forth without my call or mother’s. They live only for destruction, tied irrevocably to one another’s strength, and ours.

I kiss my first fingertip and release the first one. Made of wind and water and the disturbed depths, she comes from a slight angle, far larger than anything the captain has encountered before. The angle is off just enough that when the ship crashes down the deep trough, it sways dangerously from port to starboard. Lake water washes over the entire craft, and two glass windows on the cabin break. The boat takes on water and begins to list to the port side. It’s survivable, yes. The men inside yell and shriek, all but one.

I kiss my second fingertip and send along the second sister.

The same size as her first sister, she will cripple the boat. The passengers can’t believe a second rogue wave is coming. It’s enormous. Their eyes widen with sheer, frozen fear as they see it. They feel the inevitable in their hummingbird-fast hearts.

The captain hollers, desperately trying to steer her straight, but now her starboard side takes the worst of it as it presses her down, a weight and force she cannot bear. She lists so badly that her keel bobs above the surface for a second, and her hull cracks—ah, such an alluring sound. The passengers are finding their upright is sideways, their down is left. I hear a bone snap and skulls crashing against the inside of the cabin. There are more screams.

I sigh. This is the sweetest part. I kiss my third finger and send along the last sister, stronger and more willful than the first two, and at least one-third more enormous. She is the youngest and the most ravenous. Now the captain knows I am here. His eyes open wider with reverence. Inside his head, he says it to himself—the Witch of November. The Three Sisters. It’s just like the tales of the Edmund Fitzgerald. He wonders if they’ll sing a song about him, too, someday.

The third sister hits the vessel with pure green water, the thick of the wave immersing everything. She cracks the hull further, and water gushes into the boat. Two of the crew have opened up the door to the cabin, now the roof of their prison. The captain refuses to leave. He’s a good man. I’ll give him an honorable death and let him stay with his lady. As water rapidly fills the cabin inch by inch and the sighing boat begins its descent, I sense the other passengers.

One is praying to God and is in too much shock to move.

One is kicking to the surface and trying to climb out of the doorway. He’s the most frightened, and his heart is black and heavy within his chest.

Another is treading water, holding a set of keys. He is panicked and trying to decide if another life is worth his.

Only one inside the vessel welcomes death. It speaks a name.

My name.

Anda, it says. I’m ready.