Jude’s heartbeat thundered. "And you want to wear us?"
"We want to love you. To beco you. To be many within one. To escape the sleep. You are the door."
"No," Grace said, voice low and fierce. "He’s not."
The figure looked at her, and its face changed again, this ti, it beca Grace’s.
"We are already within you."
And with that, it vanished.
Gone in a heartbeat, leaving only the quiet hum of the forest.
Jude turned to the others. They were breathing hard, clutching weapons, shaking. Serena collapsed to her knees. Natalie pulled her close.
"I think it’s telling the truth," Jude said quietly. "Whatever it is... it’s part of the island. Part of the dream. Maybe this whole place isn’t real, not like we thought."
Sophie was pale. "Then what do we do?"
Jude looked back at the arch through the trees, its fra now distant and strange.
"We go back," he said. "We regroup. We plan."
They didn’t argue.
The walk back was slow, tense. Every movent in the shadows made them flinch. By the ti they crossed through the arch again, the camp felt like a foreign place. Safe, maybe, but not untouched.
That night, they sat around the fire again. No one touched their food.
Jude stood slowly.
"We know now this thing has a voice. It has a purpose. And it wants . That makes the bait. So I need you all to promise sothing."
The fire crackled.
"If I start to change, really change, I need you to stop . No matter what it takes."
His wives looked at him with a mix of terror and defiance. Susan was the first to shake her head.
"No. That’s not an option."
"It has to be," Jude said. "I won’t let it use to get to you."
"Then we fight it," Scarlett said.
"And if we can’t?" he asked.
Lucy t his gaze. "Then we burn the island down."
Silence followed.
Then Emma whispered, "What if we can’t leave?"
Jude looked into the flas. "Then we find a way to wake up."
The fire burned low.
And sowhere, just beyond the light, sothing smiled.
The rain had started again, not in torrents, but as a fine mist that clung to everything, skin, leaves, the wooden planks of the treehouse platforms. Jude stood at the edge of the rope bridge between the upper platforms, his hands wrapped around a vine-covered post, watching the jungle below breathe in low, wet fog. The mist wrapped around the trees like a second skin, and every few seconds, a branch creaked sowhere in the distance, as though the forest itself was shifting in its sleep. Behind him, the murmur of quiet voices ca from inside the treehouse. Firelight flickered against the woven walls, Sophie and Zoey were boiling herbs for the evening al, the scent of wild onion and pepper leaves rising into the humid air. Scarlett was sharpening a bone knife on a smooth rock, the repetitive rasping sound almost soothing. And yet Jude felt no calm.
There was sothing under his skin now, sothing crawling, like tiny sparks of unease catching in his nerves. It wasn’t the rain, or the forest, or the monsters that sotis watched from the trees. It was what had been happening. Slowly. Quietly. And so far, only he seed to notice.
Emma had been the first, at least the first he truly noticed. Out on the beach with the fish traps, she’d gone from calm conversation to sudden heat, her voice dropping, her hands brushing over his chest like fireflies. And then, blank. Eyes wide. Frightened. Confused. She didn’t rember. Then Grace, that afternoon. She’d pinned him to the bark of the banyan tree they’d been climbing for fruit, whispering things that made his spine crawl and his stomach twist. She’d acted like a stranger wearing Grace’s face, voice deeper, smile unfamiliar. And then, just like Emma, nothing. She blinked, asked what they were doing, where the fruit bag had gone, why her knees hurt. No mory of what she’d said or done.
He hadn’t told them yet. Not everything. Not the pattern. Not the growing frequency. They were already frightened after the last encounter with the blue smoke, the way it had crept into their fire circle like it had always belonged there, and whispered with no mouth, no form. Jude had thought they could hold strong, together, if they stuck to their routines, if they watched for signs, trusted each other. But now the signs were everywhere, and the trust, the trust was fraying like old rope.
Behind him, Serena stepped out of the treehouse, carrying a net bag of stripped bark and leaves for the dicine pots. She saw him and smiled, though her eyes were tired. "You’re thinking again," she said softly. "I can tell by the way your hands won’t stop twitching."
Jude smiled despite himself and rubbed his fingers against the post. "That obvious?"
"To , yes." She leaned beside him. "Everything feels... off, doesn’t it?"
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. She looked out at the jungle with him, and for a long mont, neither of them said anything.
By dinner, the rain had stopped, and the firepit was roaring under the canopy tarp. The wives had gathered, a mix of voices and laughter rising and falling with the crackle of fla. Fish grilled over coals, wrapped in broad leaves, the scent drifting thick into the night. Nefertari, quiet and thoughtful lately, handed out cups of warm fruit-wine, while Stella tried to coax Scarlett into one of her ridiculous stories about catching a snake with her bare hands. Everything seed normal. Almost too normal.
Jude watched them. He sat with his arms around Lucy and Alia, letting their warmth settle into him. But his eyes flicked from face to face. Natalie had been distant all day. Susan had dropped a basket of roots earlier, then stood staring at it for almost a full minute before shaking herself. Sophie had called Zoey by the wrong na twice. These weren’t things they usually did.
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