[Bonus chapter]The Shipwreck
Ilona pulled herself over the rail of the ship and dropped down onto the deck with a thud. She laid there for a moment and took it in. Never in her wildest dreams would she have imagined she would ever see her ship again. Ilona had assumed it was sitting at the bottom of the ocean by now and had been working hard not to think about it.
Now, here she was on the very decks she had learned to walk and spent the majority of her life on. Her ship may never sail again, but it was somehow comforting to her that it wouldn't simply vanish into the depths.
Ilona pushed herself up, her shoulder burning and aching as she did so. She needed to find the ladder so Mason could come up before he got too cold down in the water. It made her smile when she turned and saw one of the rope ladders rolled up and still in its place beneath the rails.