NOVEL NEXT 351 Seeking the Island Alyko
August darted beneath a crumbling stone structure once she was out into the forest air, feeling a surge of relief at having escaped that corpse of a castle. Looking back at it reminded her of the skeletal remains of a giant creature.
It was dark on the outside of the castle, but the green tint of the trees made it welcoming—like a womb that one could burrow into and stay protected. She wondered if this was part of the appeal for the vampire.
It was interesting. Zagan was a non-living, non-dying thing that apparently wanted to experience both, and it seemed as though he had made himself a kind of womb to live in until the time came—a womb of tightly woven trees. The trees bent protectively over his corpse-like home, shielding him from the light and keeping him hidden.
But he had still allowed light, hadn't he? Her gaze followed the path of the bending trees toward where they hailed the sun, bowing before where it shone through in that one circular opening above the infirmary. It was like an eye with the tree trunks imitating the furrows of a hazel colored iris.
"He wants to live before he dies," she whispered to herself, somehow knowing it to be so.
It was true—he wanted to die. But he also wanted to live. Why else would he have surrounded himself with so much life? And the infirmary was clearly a greenhouse at some point with the panels of windows along the walls and ceiling, so he had even created a dedicated portion of his home to the flourishing of green life.
A flashback of her vision in suicide forest of death's rotating eye lit in her mind. This place reminded her of it, but it was different—suspended rather than rotating. It needed someone to set it in motion. What a massive job… was this what she was intended for? To see the vampire's desire for life, the purpose behind this organic structure he had created, and bring the final needed element to make it so?
These trees were like the kindling of La Loba's fire and the castle the scattered remains of a creature that she had chosen to reanimate, but August wasn't La Loba. She didn't know how to accomplish something of that magnitude. She didn't have the song or the words that could resonate across dimensions and pull something back into being.
She sighed and released the metaphor from her mind, focusing on the task at hand—to find the other alyko on the island. She would worry about how to birth a vampire amongst the living later. Perhaps a solution would manifest itself in the interim. Perhaps La Loba would make herself known when the right circumstances aligned.
The truly beneficial thing about how Zagan had bent these trees so that they were all reaching inward was that it made navigating out of the dense forest remarkably easy. After she planned the path she would take out, she closed her eyes to feel the Veiled moving through and around her, hoping it would guide her better than her eyes, for she didn't know where the lycans on this island were. They were likely concentrated where the alyko were, so she would need help and highly attuned senses to avoid them.
Penelope said she couldn't make herself invisible with alyko abilities, but honestly—what did Penelope truly know about the potential of the alyko? If August was meant to do the impossible by bringing about the vampire's death, then surely they had to keep the realm of possibility open to more than what was already known. And Sage had hidden both her and himself when Lucas was chasing after them that one time…
Was Sage remarkable amongst the alyko? Perhaps he was. He had opened the portal for her into that healing space where the tree guardian resided. There was so much she needed to ask Penelope. Did Penelope have access to a place like that? Did all alyko? Or was it just those who were more fae in their genetic makeup? And what was the threshold between alyko and fae, if there was one?
Thankfully Sage was safe. Last she saw him, he was running to alert the others about the threat in the woods. She couldn't bear the thought of him being here somewhere if he had stayed with her and been caught.
When August neared the edge of the dense woods, it became even darker with the tree trunks clustered tightly together and the opening to the sun above the infirmary far back behind her. But then she broke through the tree line, and the sun was blinding. She had to shield her eyes from it until they adjusted. She stayed close to the trees behind her so she couldn't be easily spotted.
Penelope was right, at least the lycans wouldn't be able to scent her. That was a huge advantage, particularly now when she was momentarily blinded and couldn't immediately tell if any were close by.
"Now where?" she whispered to herself.
The land here was beautiful. The grass was a lush, happy green and there were trees that were left to freely grow their own way rather than being manipulated like the ones over the vampire's castle. It reminded her of the shire where one might expect to come across merry hobbits going about their day, preparing for festivities. This was not how she would have expected Zagan's island to be.
She started out toward where a foot path had been worn in the grass, but she didn't walk directly on it—instead keeping as close to the surrounding trees as she was able. Thankfully no one appeared to be around. If only Penelope could be here figuring this out with her. She thought about Penelope stuck in the room with gold cuffs around her wrists and ankles and felt a stab of guilt. But if August could find the alyko, hopefully it would make their time here shorter.