CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
(Part B)
The altar was nearly gone—swallowed by the island as if tired of waiting. Nara's ghostly figure stood unmoving, a sentinel to sorrow. The grove had become a vortex. Trees bent inward. The very sky above twisted into spirals of blackened clouds, flashing with crimson lightning.
Kairo clenched his fists, feeling the pull of something deeper than fear. It wasn't just about who would stay. It was about what the island wanted—what it fed on.
Sacrifice wasn't punishment.
It was currency.
"Kairo!" Ember shouted through the wind. "We can't let this place decide for us!"
The ground split further. A massive stone slab burst through the soil near the altar, carving upward like a jagged tombstone. Across its surface, carvings morphed and moved—showing past offerings. Faces etched into the stone writhed and cried out. Some screamed silently. Others wept. All were lost.
Lewin stepped toward the stone, his expression unreadable. "I think… I know what it wants."
He reached into his coat and pulled out the charred notebook—the one he had written in feverishly since the island twisted their timelines. He flipped it open. The pages moved themselves, stopping at a blank one. And then—ink began to appear. Not by his hand.
A name.
Kairo.
Lewin's mouth trembled. "It's choosing you."
"No," Ember said, stepping between them. "That book lied before. We all saw things that weren't real."
"But this—" Lewin whispered, "—this feels like prophecy."
Kairo stared at the page. His name burned into it like a scar. But deep within, something rebelled. The island had chosen enough. He had lost enough.
"You think I'll just accept it?" Kairo's voice rose, trembling not from fear but fury. "You think I'll give myself over to whatever this is?"
> "If you do not choose," Nara whispered, her voice now laced with thunder, "you all stay."
Suddenly the earth groaned, and vines erupted from beneath them. One coiled around Lewin's leg, another around Ember's waist. Kairo was flung back, the wind knocked from his lungs. He coughed and rolled, eyes stinging from the blood-red mist that poured from the trees.
The altar began to rise again—no longer stone, but bone. Human. Stacked vertebrae formed a new podium. The vines lifted Lewin and Ember toward it like puppets in a gruesome ritual.
> "One. Must. Remain."
Kairo screamed their names, crawling through the writhing roots, slashing with his pocket knife. Blood oozed from the soil, the island bleeding with every strike.
Then it happened.
Ember's vine loosened.
She dropped hard onto the ground, dazed but alive.
Lewin, however, was still rising.
He wasn't resisting.
"Kairo…" he called, choking back a sob. "Let me do this. Please."
"No!" Kairo shouted, standing at last.
"I was never meant to return," Lewin whispered. "My story ended before this even began. But you—you still hear the ocean as something hopeful."
His face twisted with sorrow, peace, and something terrifyingly brave.
"This is how I matter."
With a roar of willpower, Kairo surged forward—leapt toward the altar—and grabbed Lewin's hand.
Time fractured.
---
A flash—
Kairo stood on the ship. Alone. The ocean calm. No jungle. No voices.
---
Another flash—
He stood in the bookstore again, the map untouched on the shelf. Had he ever taken it?
---
Another flash—
Kairo held the compass. It was working again. Pointing due north. But blood dripped from his other hand. He looked down.
Lewin's notebook was there. And on its cover, written in ink that shimmered like moonlight:
> "You brought us here. You brought us back."
---
Back in the grove…
The vines had vanished. The storm had ended.
The altar… gone.
Nara was no longer visible, but her presence lingered—like a memory too loud to forget.
Kairo knelt in the dirt, panting. Ember was beside him, eyes wide in disbelief. The grove was empty now. No stone. No roots. No sign of Lewin.
Only his notebook.
And his sacrifice.
A final wind whispered through the trees—not cruel, not angry.
Grateful.
---
That night, Kairo and Ember sat on the cliff's edge of the island, overlooking a sea that no longer growled. The moon hung low and red above the horizon, casting a mournful glow across the waves.
"I didn't want it to be him," Kairo said softly.
"I know," Ember replied. "Neither did I."
They sat in silence, the crash of distant waves the only rhythm between them.
But even in the quiet…
Kairo could hear the island still breathing.
Still watching.
Still waiting.
---
🔥 END OF CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 🔥