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“Spirit of the forest, oracle, child of David.”

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“Right.  Of course it don’t matter,” Emre replied tiredly.  A conclusion he’d heard before on the island.  From people who, Emre supposed, had expectations of something comprehensible.  People who had certain types of hope.

All of them disappointed, sinking into a sort of bleak nihilism.

“Right luv, if you’re gonna go all emo, we need to line your eyes with kohl and give you an undercut first, yeah.  Look the part.  Right now you got a distinct wild Toni-flavour about you.  Cleaner, though.  Not so ripe as Tones.”

He watched her pale slim hand, burning through bark as effortlessly as Iyaz had burned his skin.  Emre loosely scratched the scarred handprint on his arm, like a phantom pain as he stared at the tree.  Burnt wood smelled better than his burnt flesh, at least.  He couldn’t touch Madi, he had to be careful around Iyaz.  Now Sylvie.  “Alright luv?  You’re looking peaky.”

And there it was.  She amended her words but Emre heard what he’d heard.  Sylvie had deliberately left, she had no intention of returning.  Nothingness or otherwise in the jungle, Sylvie wanted to be in it, far away from everything. 

So she’d said ‘it didn’t matter’ because she didn’t want to tell him the truth: her preference of location.  It wasn’t here.  It was separated, isolated, just herself and her self-blame.  Menace to society, Sylvie.  

It was the island, she said, that forced her back here.  To the one place she didn’t want to return.

Emre’s expression went unchanged, aside from his dropped eyes, lips pursed upwards in a decidedly resigned, obstinate position.  He nodded slowly, without argument.

“Up to two centuries at least, before some unleashed monster ice-spikes the fuck out of you,” Emre said, tone so dry it was brittle and dusty.  He looked to where she pointed, and started to walk in that direction, not checking to see if Sylvie was following behind.  

“I were headed to the farm.  No - I were headed home. Was coming from the coves innit.  Got turned around.” Emre realized he’d finally said it, out loud.  Home. To Sylvie, of all people.  

“That handprint you left, on the tree,” Emre said, as the thick jungle finally opened up, showing the way.  “Could be used as a marker, yeah.  Others do that innit.  Mallory’s got carvings in the trees, little flowers with smiley faces.  And Luke’s got some sort of tree marker too.  Suppose they do it so they don’t get lost.”  Emre looked back over his shoulder at Sylvie.  

“Suppose you could do it so you know where you’ve been.  Don’t retrace steps innit.”

∞

Sylvie hummed in apathetic agreement, avoiding Emre’s gaze in favor of hunting out slivers of sky through the treetops. The canopy was dense, there weren’t many holes in it to be found, and the whole situation was only compounding her sudden, uncharacteristic claustrophobia. 

Maybe Emre’s comment about looking the part and going emo would have made her laugh, given a change in circumstances, but Sylvie was hung up on what came next - that she looked wild, like Toni. 

Besides the way she’d been taught to show out for the fortunetelling tent, all long hair and strings of jewelry and shimmering dress, Sylvie rarely thought twice about her appearance. The island only compounded this indifference, literally stripping her of her costumes and any desire to present a certain way beyond, well, the way she looked at any given moment. 

Still, there in front of Emre, she couldn’t help raising her cool hand to wipe at her face, run through her hair, right her clothes as best she could. It wasn’t much, and it didn’t abate the feeling that swirled around her stomach and tasted almost like embarrassment. 

Her other hand clenched and relaxed at her side, working out the stiffness that came whenever she unintentionally burnt stuff. Sylvie rubbed them together, then, brushing off the charred tree bark and shaking her head with attempted nonchalance. “I’m fine,” she answered a little too quickly, “Working on it.” 

Not that she knew what it even was, anymore. Her fire, or her being there at all.

“Right. I guess that’s more time than most,” her reply was frail, transparent. Sylvie had slipped up. She knew she’d said too much, and that’s when Emre started to run cold. He didn’t even look back when he started headed home. 

Home. Imagine that. Each thing he said had Sylvie retreating further and further into herself, even as she trailed behind him, freezing in place only when he peered over his shoulder to send his next blow.

— ⋆ ✯ ⋆ —

Tamyra hasn’t ever really been one to get behind the whole “we’re gone and this is some kind of afterlife” theory merely by principle, considering if that was true, she could never get her real life back, but there was no getting back out of this island, and the idea now hit her like a sack of potatoes thanks to Sylvie’s words.

“I’m sorry, that you couldn’t find them, that they’re–” but she couldn’t say they were gone. They couldn’t be sure, could never be sure anymore. Even though she is almost certain her mom was gone and it’s been eating her alive from the inside, she also could never possibly get actual confirmation. Nor could Sylvie, or anyone else. “I’m really sorry.”

She bit the inside of her cheeks before she asked. “Do you think that’s the case? That we’re all dead and we’re the ones who aren’t actually here? Do you really think there is a viable chance for that?” All of them arrived after they almost died in one way or another. Could it have been that they’ve been dead all along and they just didn’t realize? Did that mean the island was doing a kindness to them by “keeping them alive” here?

No, that last one was definitely not the case, no matter how they were here. No matter what, being stuck on this island wasn’t a kindness. It was anything but.

So Sylvie went into the jungle. “Did you find what you were looking for?” she asked. Sylvie just went in there and found a good place to hide - good and dangerous. At least nothing bad happened, but with everything going on lately, it was probably luck that played a huge part in Sylvie making through those days in the jungle. Or maybe it wasn’t luck, but the jungle not wanting to hurt the woman, if it also brought her back to the North Beach.

It wouldn’t have made much sense, but the island was weird about some things, and Aurélie and Emre talked about the jungle leading them back to the farm, so it looked like the island has been doing stuff like that these days.

Something else did catch her attention, though. “What do you mean you wouldn’t have come back, Sylvie? What were you going to do, live alone in the jungle?”

∞

“You don’t have anything to apologize for,” Sylvie shook her head sadly, an echo of a smile etching itself into her somber expression as she shrugged the apology off, “Not your fault. You know - you helped me look, and everything. Thank you.” She couldn’t exactly say it was okay, since it wasn’t, but Sylvie didn’t want Tamyra to feel overly apologetic for this weight they both had to bear. 

It didn’t occur to her, then, that Tamyra was showing some compassion that she could simply accept instead of buffer against. Apologies, pity - these were things that rarely made their way to Sylvie growing up, and she was not well versed in receiving any kind of sympathy. Her mother plunged forward through everything like some kind of juggernaut, with no regrets or apologies. Sylvie had always struggled to follow suit, as she was in the wake of her unexpected return. It was a struggle, fighting the urge to apologize for everything while also holding in mind that she’d do what she needed to at any cost. 

She shook her head harder, a deep crease appearing between her brows as she furrowed them. “You can’t die if you’re already dead,” she said quite bluntly, setting her eyes on the horizon to avoid Tamyra’s own jewel-like stare, “So no, I don’t. I don’t know what I think we are, what happened to us, but I don’t think we’re dead.” 

Exhaling heavily, she shifted her legs out in front of her and rolled her shoulders back. Her bones crackled, diffusing some of the tension that had taken up residence there in the past few weeks. 

“I didn’t find anything,” Sylvie tried not to sound to exasperated, but there was a certain edge to her voice that she couldn’t contain, “Just me, there.” She never did figure out what she was searching for, whether it was the monster, or truth, or some combination of the two. Maybe she was asking all the wrong questions, or maybe there were no answers to be found.

Sylvie had yet to get lost again return to the jungle in any meaningful way, though her questions about the nature of the island seemed to multiply enough to create a forest in her own mind. She wanted answers, answers that neither the island nor her tarot cards could give her. It was time, she knew, to ask around, see what pieces of information she could collect from more experienced islanders that might offer some sliver of illumination in the darkness.

The trouble was finding someone who wouldn’t ask her too many questions in return.

Of all the people she’d come across on the island so far, Luke seemed like her best option. Their initial encounter had been neutral, in Sylvie’s eyes, and from what she gathered he didn’t seem like the type to interrogate her in the way she was fearing. He was a hunter, and clearly spent enough time in the jungle to have something to say to her about it. 

So she’d spent the past few days waking with the sun, wandering around and hoping she’d run into Luke selling his game, since she really wasn’t sure where to go looking for him. It almost surprised her when she did end up running into him, so much so that it took her a minute to remember why she’d been searching in the first place.

“Hey,” she sidled up to him, lips poised in a friendly-enough smile, “You spend a lot of time in the jungle, right? Do you think I could ask you something?”

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Emre had watched a documentary once, about the great nothing of outer space.  A vacuum of existence.  That was what he’d meant, and what Sylvie then confirmed.  The only difference being, where Emre felt a certain cold, unfeeling, uncaring peace in that nothing (whenever he’d experienced it), Sylvie’s experience in the jungle’s idea of ‘nothing’ was horrible.  Emre looked down at the ragged hem of her skirt.  

Muted, he asked, “Is this any better?”

He looked up again as she revealed the most unexpected set of motivations for her disappearance.  That terrible cave-monster, their escape, her brilliant plan to destroy it turned sour amidst the fog and the island’s mockery of hope for escape, of her parent’s voices.  Fault and blame circling back and in on itself like some sort of karmic cyclone, that landed on Matthew and killed him.  And there was Sylvie, thinking she stood in the middle of that cyclone. 

Except…

“Maybe you’re right,” Emre mused, frowning at his trainers.  He touched his throat then, thinking about the rain monster.  Him and Aurélie had killed it (he hoped), that very night right before the fog cleared, and Matthew was found dead.

And Sylvie and him (well, more Sylvie, she was right to take credit for it) killed that other monster in the cave with her fire.  What if the island was casting retribution?  At this point, after what Emre had seen in his failed sailing attempt with Aurélie and Tamyra, after his adventure with Frank, he knew the island…sensed.  Reacted. Knew.

Still, telling Sylvie that her self-blame was right might not be what she wanted to hear.  “Likely you didn’t kill that thing in the cave though.  Likely it just got trapped innit.  Blowing the cave entrance kept it where it belongs, yeah.  In the dark, lost in them tunnels.  You saw how it reacted to your fire, probably couldn’t come into the light even if it wanted.”

Carefully, he added.  “I reckon you know, Sylvs. I know too - if this bloody island wants something done, it’ll do it.  We got no say in that. The island…controls things.”

‘Do you know what it’s like to know something in your soul?‘

Yes, he did; but it was nothing good, not in his rotted soul.  Emre just stayed quiet, pretending the question was rhetorical and focusing on her own diminished internal voice.  “Well luv, you got years to sort it out innit.  Decades, even.”  Maybe it was bleak, but Emre’s smile was sardonic.  “This fucking island.” 

He nodded and turned, looking up at the sky.  It was dark now.   “Right.  We could put you on the farm, then. Madz and Pippa bunk in the warehouse sometimes innit. Which I believe is…erm…”  Emre looked around, trying to get his bearings.

∞

Was it any better? Was the complete isolation of the forest any better or worse than how she felt on the beach, alone but surrounded by all of these people? 

Sylvie couldn’t say, or she wouldn’t. Not to Emre, not even to herself.

“It doesn’t matter if this is better,” her eyes met his for an instant before flicking away. At least that was somewhat honest. Sylvie knew what she felt didn’t matter to the island, that whatever happened to her would play out regardless of her emotions and opinions. Her lifelong conversation with the Universe, so she’d come to think of it, had become lopsided. It didn’t seem like she was speaking to anything anymore, and what was once a great comfort had left behind an open sore.

Emre’s tentative agreement tore the wound even wider, being simultaneously what she needed to hear and what she was most afraid of. Sylvie swayed a little, pressing her palm into the tree behind her to steady herself. The bark sizzled at her touch and she swore under her breath when she looked back to see a singed handprint. Her own hand glowed pink with heat, and she stared at it briefly before dropping it to her side. 

It was fine, she’d be fine. One way or another.

She swallowed hard, nodding vacantly along as her attention returned to Emre, “Yeah. Likely.” Sylvie had developed her own theories about what happened in the cave, namely that the monster was deterred not by her fire but by the element of surprise - and truly, it hadn’t been the only one surprised by the unexpected command of her attunement. The fire had come on strong and only kept coming, equal parts terrifying and delightful.

It was more of a nuisance in that moment than anything, though, and Sylvie did what she could to quench the fire in her hollow chest. “That’s how it goes, isn’t it? I wouldn’t have come b- I would have stayed lost, I figured I was near the other side of the island when I stepped out onto the North Beach. The island brought me back,” she shuffled her feet a bit, kicking absently at the leaf litter. 

“Centuries,” Sylvie huffed, mirroring Emre’s little grin with her own cynical smile. Maybe a few had already gone by.

— ⋆ ✯ ⋆ —

The waves were quietly coming in and out not too far from them and it was surprisingly quiet and peaceful, completely contradicting the emotions that were coming to the surface in Tamyra, and probably what was going down inside of Sylvie as well.

So she wasn’t going to push. Tamyra was just glad Emre was completely wrong - really, it was a fog that helped people get lost in the matter of seconds, and the first thought Emre had was Sylvie walked into the ocean (granted, she disappeared after everything happened, but Tamyra had too, she was sure the two of them weren’t the only ones who needed time), so she figured she’d just sit there with Sylvie with a while before they’d start talking.

Sitting in quiet felt more and less comfortable at the same time these days.

It’s Sylvie who broke the silence not too long after, though, and Tamyra couldn’t help the shark, bitter bark of a laughter that burst out of her. “Yeah, everything definitely went to shit, you could say that.” She reached up to play with the necklace hanging around her neck - she has refused to take it off since she got it back, and since that night, she’s been playing with it a lot more.

“You haven’t found them, haven’t caught up with them, have you?” Tamyra asked quietly. She lost Sylvie still chasing after her parents, and Emre said she was doing the same when he saw her. It must have been the entire night for Sylvie, too. “That’s why you needed to get away from everything and everyone, hmm?”

She flicked the little pendant on the necklace around and pulled her legs under herself. “Where did you go? I’m assuming not actually in the ocean and not the jag, that–” She was there, and even though it’s not the smallest of places, there could have been others and she could have not noticed, she automatically assumed that if anyone was there, she would have been unlucky enough to run into them. “Somewhere in the jungle?” That really was the only option, probably. Maybe the coves on the other side of the island, but a few people were usually lurking around there.

“Did the getting away helped?” it probably didn’t, Tamyra was painfully aware of the possibility of that, but she still had to ask, still wanted to see if it helped even the tiniest bit because then maybe she could try to make that pain that she still felt over her mom stop.

∞

Sylvie’s mind was still out somewhere close to the horizon, rolling on top of the waves while she made her little comment about everything going to shit. Tamyra’s sharp, humorless laugh pulled her into the moment, and she couldn’t keep a small smile from growing on her face as vacant as it was. 

It didn’t last very long, however, and she chewed on the inside of her cheek in place of answering Tamyra for a beat. “They’re gone, Tam,” she looked over at her friend, searching for those eyes that glittered in the moonlight like little gems. Her heart grew heavier and heavier, threatening to open up like a black hole and consume everything in its vicinity. 

“Or, I’m gone. They were never here. I was never going to find them.”

In fact, they weren’t what she had gone looking for at all, but Sylvie was hesitant to tell Tamyra just what she’d been running toward. “I just needed to go away, go see something,” she offered her story, flimsy as tissue paper. Absently, she dug her hand into the sand and lifted up a palmful, holding it aloft.

“I didn’t go into the ocean,” she shook her head slowly, letting the sand slip through her fingers and fall back onto the beach, “Not the jag, either, I couldn’t get there alone anyway. No, I went into the jungle. I was in there for a few days.” At least, that’s what they had told her when she got back. The time in there stretched and shrank unpredictably, and Sylvie hadn’t cared much about keeping track of the hours. 

She sighed, wishing she had a different answer for Tamyra, one that offered a little more hope. Of course the island would have none of that, and her face twisted into a bitter expression. 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Strange, how some people could look so young, yet so old at the same time.  Like Sylvie’s smooth oval face didn’t quite match the spirit within.  Emre felt like he was talking to some liminal creature from a fairy-story.  He didn’t say any of this to Sylvie though, because it might just sound like mockery, coming from his own belief-rooted mouth. Inshallah, and all.

But this island had a way of changing beliefs, and Emre wondered what beliefs it had changed in Sylvie.

She drooped, from dismay or resolve, or some realisation playing out inside that complex starry mind of hers.  Sylvie wouldn’t take his joke and self-deprecation with her usual humour, but Emre was too caught in her gaze to think about that.  Her eyes seemed both seeing and unseeing at the same time.  Milky, like moons. Emre’s rational mind tried to tell him it was just a trick of the moonlight, striking enough to at least appreciate, if not venerate.

Her question made Emre flush, embarrassed that he had a ready answer.  But one very grounded in ugly reality.  

“In a way,” he said softly, thinking of all the times he’d ‘lost himself’ - in drugs or sex, or switching his mind off to revel in the torture, the kill.  But it did feel like Sylvie described.  “Like a vacuum for me, innit. Like how they describe outer space.” Like he sucked the air, the life, the everything out of whatever he took. Like he was a black hole.  No, that probably wasn’t what Sylvie was describing at all.  

“Did it feel good at least?” Emre asked, as that was his usual reason to lose himself.  

Emre stared at her when she made her admission.  She’d gone off on her own, in search of the cave monster.  He wanted to yell at Sylvie, tell her she was mad for doing something so reckless.  But she was still here, wasn’t she?  She seemed to consider her jaunt a failure, by coming back; but selfishly, Emre was relieved for it.  

“Bloody hell.  Why, Sylvs?  Why would you do that?  You thought you’d find some answer, what.  Some revelation?  That nothing out there - that was your answer, weren’t it.  Nothing but you, alone, just you. Fucking hell…that’s bloody bleak innit.  No wonder you’re gutted, like.”

Emre exhaled, rubbing his face and wishing he had something to lose himself, right now.  Like a hit of cocaine, or a good mindless fuck.  “No luv, your - your tent, it’s gone.  During the fog, it got ruined.  I’m sorry.  Mine too, yeah.  Had to relocate near East Beach.”

∞

Even in the growing darkness, Sylvie couldn’t hide herself from Emre’s prying eyes. The way he looked at her with such rapt attention made her feel seen, open, vulnerable. Inexplicably, it made her miss the invisibility she’d grown accustomed to in the regular world, as much a blessing as it was a curse, her cloak that she’d so lovingly crafted out of the pain of a lifetime of misunderstandings. The island had ripped that from her, too, not that she needed anything else to mourn.

Emre was quick to answer, divulging that he’d lost himself in the past, and if they were having a different conversation Sylvie would have asked him what he meant when he said it was like a vacuum. “It didn’t feel like anything,” she winced, shaking her head gravely, “It was horrible.” Sylvie was aware of the contradiction, but found herself unable or unwilling to clarify. 

She thought back to her time away, those couple of days that felt like hours and weeks all at once whenever she tried to understand them in a linear way. She’d felt broken and feral, so free that she’d become some untethered, wild thing. What could Emre possibly know about that? Did she even want him to know?

His reaction was much milder than she anticipated, but Sylvie couldn’t help but look at Emre like he’d slapped her. She raised a shaky hand to her mouth, wiping the look from her face as she tried to think up a cogent reply. 

“I thought - I thought it was my fault, that maybe because I killed that thing, something came back and killed the First.” Her shoulders slumped, but telling Emre about her fear didn’t feel like much of a weight off. “I thought it was my fault. Everything. So I left,” she pursed her lips, fighting the urge to look away, “I was wrong, I guess. I thought I was lost, and the next thing I knew I was on the North Beach. The island sent me back.” 

“I used to have answers, Emre,” Sylvie forced herself to meet her friend’s pointed stare, “Not all of them, but enough. I never had to search for them, either. Do you know what it’s like to know something in your soul?” Her voice faltered, and she swallowed the lump that rose in her throat, “Whatever used to talk to me is quiet now.”

[ @sybilsylvie ]

Emre said Sylvie was gone. Walked into the ocean or maybe lost to the jungle, Emre wasn’t sure, just that she was gone. One second there, the next he couldn’t find her anywhere. Just like how Tamyra lost Sylvie before that in the fog, too - one second the woman was there, the next she was gone.

Emre was also convinced that Sylvie was forever gone, but unlike Matthew, nobody actually found a body and knowing just what Sylvie was chasing down in the fog, knowing how seeing her own mom affected Tamyra, she hoped that Sylvie was just off somewhere, taking some time to gather herself and then sooner or later return to the beach. But since nobody has seen any real proof of that, Tamyra couldn’t be certain.

And that uncertainty was enough for her that when she noticed Sylvie sitting in the same place where she found her on New Year’s Eve (more like stumbled over her in the dark, but that was a minor detail she didn’t want to think about), she stopped dead in her track for a moment, wondering if Sylvie really was there or if she was just seeing things.

It was dusk now, Tamyra preferred going out around this time (less visibility, at least in her mind, which helped her peace of mind) and usually chose parts of the beach where less people were around.

Tamyra just watched Sylvie for a moment, two, three, before she headed over - shoulders and her back straight, holding her head high as much as she could as if nothing happened, a habit she especially picked up since she got out of Aurélie’s hut (pretending nothing happened could easily work towards people not making comments about her scar).

She walked up to Sylvie, poked the woman in the shoulder without any prompting or anything just to make sure she was really there, gave a small, relieved smile when she could feel that Sylvie really was there. “Sorry, just– had to make sure. Emre told me some things,” Tamyra explained and then settled down next to the woman, looking out at the sea. “Glad he was wrong, too. Didn’t truly believe you’d just walk into the ocean like that, though–” she’d get the gut reaction after what Sylvie went through. She did not want to say that though.

∞

The beach felt smaller at night. Maybe Sylvie had grown too used to the tight squeeze of the jungle, the low ceiling of the canopy, the space created by the trees that felt like inside and outside all at once. The beach, hourglass after hourglass of glittering sand, felt especially vast upon her return. It was more comfortable to slink around in the dark, she found, as much as she had missed the unfiltered sunshine of the day. 

There were less people milling about, as well. As sick as it made her feel inside, Sylvie found herself longing for the unnatural silence she’d experienced during her time away. The memory of how maddening it had been was slipping away day by day as life on the North Beach proved to be just as, if not more, overwhelming to her.

In her typical way, she’d slunk off to sit, stare off, and be in her mind for a while. Sylvie had heard the footsteps approaching, but kept on looking out at the ocean until she felt a tap on her shoulder. “That’s okay,” she brushed off Tamyra’s apology, mirroring her relieved smile with one much more weary, “It’s good to see you.” 

And it was. She gave her friend a long look, noticing the recent scar on her face but being mindful not to let her eyes linger there for more than an instant. What happened to her? She’d have to find out some other way - Sylvie knew better than to ask after something so vulnerable, lest she hurt Tamyra’s feelings. 

“Emre was wrong,” she nodded slowly, pressing her lips together before continuing, “Not his fault, though. I did kind of disappear.” At least she could admit to trying to leave everyone behind, even if it was unclear what she’d been running toward. Sylvie slumped forward, turning her gaze back out to sea and resting her chin on her knees. 

Her eyes followed the foam, watching it twinkle like the starriest sky as it was pushed and pulled along the surf. It was beautiful, or it should have been. Sylvie sighed quietly and remarked, “Everything kind of went to shit, huh?” 

Teak listened to Sylvie’s response about her ability to navigate starless, with utterly no sense of how … off the conversation was, the idea of her carrying stars with her in order to find her way around. He’d said it in earnest, and she’d replied just as seriously, so therefore it was a thing that was both possible and real. And why not? Look at where they were and what had got them here, as Sylvie herself keenly pointed out. “Does it work for you in the normal world?” Teak wondered aloud, looking up at the sky even though it was daytime and obviously there were no stars to be consulted. “Hey, you’d probably know – are the stars in this sky the same? As when you looked at them back home?”

She made the cutest little pissy noise (which surprised him; he’d expected that Sylvie annoyed would be Sylvie withdrawn, but maybe that wasn’t the case) and Teak resisted reaching out to play with a lock of her hair and instead focused on her reaction to news of his brother. Interesting was sort of a lacklustre response, and he was about to get huffy himself when Sylvie added on some more and he beamed at her sympathy.

“It’s bad,” he confirmed. “His ‘boyfriend’–” Teak used the biggest of air quotes, with a roll of his eyes, “–decided to move on to the next younger man and poor Jamie took it hard. Uh, he didn’t off himself or anything! He would never. He got mugged and thrown in the canal. I’ve never seen this canal but apparently it’s there and you can get thrown in it if somebody stabs you.” Teak made a distraught sound, still finding the idea intensely distressing. “He’s so sweet. I mean stupid in that one way for choosing such old mean boyfriends, but gosh, the absolute sweetest.” 

And then, when Teak explained his jellyfish problem, Sylvie whistled. For a moment Teak didn’t know what to do. It was such an odd, boyish response, and he reminded himself that she was kind of a weirdo, this girl. Still, she didn’t seem to be taking off, so he launched into his explanation. “I didn’t get stung thank goodness, I’m not in a hurry for anybody to take a whizz on me to neutralize the poison!” He laughed, incredulous and relieved. “But I was thinking – you’re a fire sign too, right? So we could dry out the water together and it would kill the little freaks. They’re not valuable life!” Teak hastened to add. “You can’t even eat them or anything! All they do is sting! Come onnnnnn, Sylvie, help me out, please.” Teak widened his eyes to their widest and bluest, which since it was a lovely sunny clear-skied day, was pretty dang blue. “I can’t let my brother get stung. He’s been through enough.”

∞

Sylvie briefly followed Teak’s gaze up to the clear sky, wondering for a moment what he was even looking at before it dawned on her. “No, it’s, uh - there’s maps, and stuff. No stars necessary, but my mom does have an old astrolabe,” she laughed nervously, unsure as usual if he was asking in earnest or just messing with her. His next question seemed genuine, though, even a little sweet, and she chided herself for feeling so defensive. “They’re the same stars in different spots. It depends on where you’re looking from,” she gestured airily with her hands, holding them aloft as though she was gesturing at a map.

“I’ve lived all over, so I never did have one home-sky. The stars here are a little different, but recognizable,” her hands fell to her sides with a soft noise and resumed their hem-wringing. Sylvie was reluctant to say too much for fear of talking Teak’s ear off, but she did hope her explanation had been sufficient. She never thought she was too good at explaining things, especially the things she knew so intrinsically that they felt impossible to put to words. 

Teak launched into the whole backstory of Jamie’s arrival on the island, leaving Sylvie little choice but to stand there and listen. “That’s - that’s awful. Just horrible,” she furrowed her brow, biting on the corner of her lip and peering down at her hands, “I’m sorry to hear all that, I really am. Hope he’s doing alright, and all that.” It was hard to do alright on the island, Sylvie was well aware, but she had a hard time thinking of anything else to say. This Jamie had been through the ringer, clearly, and Teak’s recounting his story had awoken some of the sympathy the jungle had put to sleep.

She arched a brow, struggling to stifle the urge to laugh at his comment about neutralizing the sting, but her face fell as Teak expanded on his plan. “I really don’t like that idea,” Sylvie said quite honestly, not bothering to mention that she was actually a water sign and instead just looking at him with slight concern, “It’s not right to go around killing things just because they’re a nuisance, not valuable, whatever you believe.” Very different, she had to remind herself, from killing something that was already out to kill. “You don’t want to use a bucket or something? I’ll help you out, I just don’t want to... boil them alive,” she wrinkled her nose at the thought, still slightly disturbed, “No, they don’t deserve that.”

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“Rose, yeah,” Emre replied as quietly as Sylvie, as if they were whispering secrets to hide from the jungle around them.  He’d forgotten it was getting dark, his eyes naturally adjusting, convincing Emre that he still had ample light to see.  Sylvie seemed to believe his side of the fog experience easily, and Emre licked his lips.

“That fog…it was fucked up for everyone, weren’t it.”  Emre frowned, feeling like there should be more to say, some sort of good to come out of it.  But he couldn’t find and good, except for one thing.  “You’re still alive.”  

Sylvie revealed her thoughts without his prompting, but Emre shook his head at her second apology.  “You apologised once, no more needed, luv.  And who’s to say you didn’t make things better, yeah?  What I mean is, maybe it could’ve been worse somehow.”

Emre leaned back from Sylvie’s ghostly laugh, embarrassed at his gaff, at his emotional state getting the better of him.  “Allow it, luv, please,” he half-pleaded, half-groused.  “You were gone for days, I thought the worst of it. Didn’t realise our girl just went on holiday to get away from me, yeah.  I did get a bit needy in the fog, weren’t I.  Yeah.  Trip to the South Beach, was it?   Is the resort there like we imagined?”

The crickets filled the air between them, and Emre belatedly saw how dark it was, and they weren’t anywhere close to North Beach yet.  “No bother, people will just be glad to see you safe as houses.”  Was she safe?  Emre still couldn’t discern what was going on, what made Sylvie disappear, what she’d meant by trying to ‘make things better’.  

Emre nodded towards the beach.  “Fancy returning?  Or - Sylvs if you’re headed back in the jungle, then I’m going with you, right.  Can’t leave you alone again.”  Emre looked at the jungle beyond her, his eyes shining and wary.  

“We both know what sort of things are in there, innit.”  His voice dropped to a low whisper.  “And the jungle, it shifts.  It changes whenever it wants.  Whole bloody island moves…”

∞

Sylvie allowed a heavy silence to sink in between them, staring hard at the ground. People had really disappeared, really died, and she couldn’t help but feel ashamed that she’d left her friends to fear the worst - for what? She’d been unsuccessful, done nothing, found nothing. The jungle, in its dead silence, had withheld any mercy.

Even so, the looming dark didn’t scare her as it once had and Sylvie blinked a few times as her eyes adjusted. The twilight turned the foliage deep blue, little slivers of lapis sky poking through and reminding her of a crystal she’d once had. She clasped her fingers absently, nearly feeling it there in her hand.

You’re still alive. It didn’t feel like she had much of a say in that anymore, and Sylvie’s small smile was leaden with hurt. Emre was being too kind in the way he tried to console her, suggesting things might have been worse if she hadn’t gone. As if she was running off to save the world and not just stew in her shame and anger. 

“I wasn’t trying to get away from you. And I’m not headed back in there. Not like that,” she shook her head sadly. Sylvie, deep down, knew her intentions had been rejected by whatever nameless force she’d been pleading with. The island not only heard her, but it answered her - though stumbling back onto the North Beach was not the outcome she wanted, the message was clear enough.

She just stood there for a while, watching him with eyes like shattered glass. After a long pause, she spoke, “You ever lose yourself? Just... poof, gone.” Sylvie furrowed her brows, chewing hard on her lip and snapping her gaze back towards the ground, “I was alone in there, Emre. Really alone, like, I didn’t even have myself.”

“I went looking for it,” she continued, her voice was hardly above a whisper. She trusted he knew what she meant, and continued her confession, “The cave was the same as when we left. But the jungle... it wasn’t like this, like how it is now.” Sylvie quieted herself for a moment, listening to the bird calls and buzzing insects that choked the air around them. “There was no life. No sounds. Nothing but me, there.”

♟

“No, I suppose you’re right,” Joaquin murmured, about the unfairness of life.  “I suppose that all depends on one’s expectations, what they hope to get out of their lives.”  But Joaquin didn’t elaborate.  Recently, with his own misgivings and failures since returning from his 8-year pilgrimage, Joaquin had second thoughts about his own life philosophies.  That perhaps his passive, drifting life, with so little expectations or goals, was not as good-intentioned and harmless as he’d thought.  That perhaps choosing inactivity could be just as damaging to others, as doing activity.  

“Sometimes I would like to lie in a field and never get up.  I want to live of course, but live as a log, yes?  With mushrooms growing on my skin, and sun on my hair, and sweet children seeking safety, finding a place to rest their weary heads.  Nothing else,” Joaquin sighed, as he watched Sylvie finding a place to curl and settle.  

With that odd confession, Joaquin set off to the farm, mixing up the mild sleeping draught with chamomile and other herbs.  He also collected some other items for her sojourn back into the jungle - food and tools that he’d found useful, during his travels.  With his cups of tea and supplies, he returned to Sylvie, handing her both cups before he ungracefully settled opposite from her.  He took one cup back, and then smiled.   Joaquin pat at the sack between them.

“Here are the supplies.  If you wake before I do, please take them.  They will help, yes?”  Joaquin drank his tea, then with a warm sigh, he flopped backwards into the grass, staring up at the sky.  “Bonne nuit, ma petite.”

End

—oOo—

The hug was accepted, which Teak hadn’t been too sure was a foregone conclusion given that when they’d last parted, Sylvie had been a little wary around him, and that the fog had really done a number on a lot of people. (Not him, of course, never him! Teak wasn’t susceptible to that sort of thing, mind control and cult stuff, they’d told him so at the Scientology Centre that one time he went in on a whim to do a personality test.)

And the hug was nice, too; Sylvie got right in there and rested her head against him, and Teak could swear she smelled like shampoo except that was impossible. “Cool,” Teak said offhandedly, before he did something like hug her tighter or stick his nose in her hair. “And good, that you found your way back from being lost. Does the mystic stuff help with that? Like finding your way around without being able to see the stars, because you carry the stars with you, I guess.”

Sylvie got right down to business, though, and Teak made a slightly guilty, apologetic face. “Yeeeeeeah! Okay, see –” he gestured broadly towards the Leander. “Did you hear about my baby brother? My little brother Jamie turned up here. I mean he’s not a real baby, he’s like five years younger than me, but still, y’know? Anyhow Jamie’s here now and he’s staying with me on the Leander in my cabin and there’s a problem with it.”

Teak sighed gustily, looking at their feet before looking back up at Sylvie. “Somebody filled our cabin with water and jellyfish,” he said glumly. “Since it’s a ship, everything’s built with little raised lips, y’know? The doorways, the bunks, everything. So somebody – some water attuned I bet – was able to fill up the cabin with a couple inches of water, and it’s full of stinging jellyfish. Full. Like, creepy thick with them.”

∞

Sylvie shifted a bit, fiddling with the hem of her shirt. “You know, not really,” she scrunched her nose, lightly shaking her head, “I might carry some stars, but they don’t really help when it comes to a poor sense of direction. I don’t think it matters much in there, either way. Things are not normal in there. Not even, like, mystic-normal.” She glanced over her shoulder at the jungle, letting out a huffy little lip trill before she reminded herself she shouldn’t get too carried away.

“Your brother!” Sylvie raised her brows in surprise, “Like, really here? That’s... interesting.”  It seemed like family reunions were more common on the island than to be expected, and she wasn’t sure how that made her feel. She nodded absently, turning it over in her mind for a few seconds before hastily adding, “I mean it’s probably a shame, whatever brought him to this place, but at least the pair of you have each other.” Sylvie never had a sibling, but she was almost certain it would beat being alone.

At the mention of a problem, she narrowed her eyes curiously. Maybe she would have laughed, if she were in a better mood and Teak didn’t look so dejected about the whole thing, but she merely let out a low whistle. His predicament almost seemed too ridiculous to be real, which lent it a bizarre kind of credence. “You’re telling me that someone filled your cabin up with jellyfish? Did you get stung?” She looked him up and down, searching for a mark. 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“See what?” Emre started to ask, but he could see Sylvie, retracting like a butterfly back into its protective cocoon.  Or maybe like a little slip of a fox, her hackles raised, little teeth bared, ready to dart back into the forest.  Emre wondered then if she’d changed, or if he’d just missed seeing what was in Sylvie all along, because he wanted to see Sylvie in one certain way.

“Never mind,” Emre quickly added, before Sylvie replied.  He didn’t want her to explain, if she didn’t want to be forthcoming.  “Have your secrets, I’m not bothered.  Just gassed you’re alive, yeah.”

Again - she snapped at him; and again Emre pressed his lips tight, holding his hands up in defense.  “Don’t stress over me just making sure, alright.  After all the madness.”

Shaking his head, Emre stepped closer.  “No.  No, I looked away from you for one second - “ Just one bloody second - “And when I looked back you was gone.  I thought you’d gone into - “ It seemed so stupid of him, now.  Silly and emotional  Emre in the dark fog, flailing through the waves, screaming for Sylvie, grieving her loss.  Emre bit it back, his face masking over coolly.  “I thought you was gone. Allow it, man.  Frank’s missus, she also went missing innit, so I got paranoid.  I was wrong, alright?  Allow it.”

Sylvie seemed to relent - and then just like that, she offered peace in the form of two beautiful names.  Emre’s gaze dropped, mouth quirking slightly.  “Moira and David,” he said softly, but kept his gaze down. A moment of privacy for Sylvie, at the mention of her father’s name.  

“You should be sorry, yeah. I thought you was gone,” Emre said, still gazing down.  But there was no ire or bite in his words.  Instead, he rubbed between his squinched eyes.  “Ah fucking hell.  I told people too, innit.  I told others that you was missing or - or - gone.”

∞

Sylvie wanted to tell Emre what she meant, and she closed her mouth just as quick as she’d opened it once he took his question back. Her secret burned in her, making her desperate to glean some kind of forgiveness or acceptance from the one person she figured would understand, but that same burning had made her too irritable and defensive to reasonably say her piece. Sylvie cursed herself for letting her emotions get the best of her.

He wasn’t bothered, he’d said. He didn’t want to hear, and she wouldn’t subject him to it. She rolled her lips between her teeth, wondering if he could feel the guilt radiating off of her in waves. It was harder and harder for her to hide how she felt, but Sylvie was losing the ability to run away from her problems the way she always had. They never seemed too far away anymore, always closing in.

“Rose is gone?” she asked hesitantly, barely a question since she already knew the answer. A deep indent formed in between her brows as she thought of Josephine and Frank, their little family that had been reunited and so cruelly split again. 

She took a breath, attempting to steady herself. “I- I thought I could make things better. I’m sorry I left,” Sylvie echoed meekly, unsure if it even really mattered anymore. It didn’t seem to, until she offered those names and heard her own in return. They almost brought a smile to her face, their little code bringing the barest sliver of comfort.

“You told people? What, that I died? Shit,” Sylvie laughed humorlessly, slamming the door on the part of her brain that suggested she might have been better off running back into the jungle that morning she found herself back on the beach. 

♟

“There were some points where I did wonder: was I Joaquin?  Or was I the person who they saw?  It was a haunting question, to question one’s sense of self.   But then again everything in the fog was haunting.  Um…dis - disorienting,” he recalled the English word.  He smiled and shook his head sadly.  “I lost María in the fog.  And that was difficult enough.  Gracias a Dios, that I found her again.”

He hummed, as he plodded along with his walking stick, agreeing with Sylvie’s conclusion.  “You and I both know how many mysteries the world holds.  That questioning every single ‘why’ and ‘how’ and ‘but what if’ can lead to madness.  Sometimes the logic is not in reason but in belief.  Acceptance…”  Joaquin sighed heavily.  

“But I also know that this disappoints a great many people.  And angers them, or hurts them deeply inside.    Fairness and deserving…they can be two very cruel concepts, when married to time and fate.”

He was glad Sylvie didn’t seem too upset about her tent in disarray, almost like she was expecting this.  Perhaps she was, or perhaps she was simply coming to accept things for what they were.  He thought then, about No’s words to him - useless and selfish, a hypocrite.   After a century, this was what he’d become; but despite their similarities, he hoped for a different path for Sylvie.  She was young, she had much more to give than he was ever capable of.  She’d do on this island for people what he could not, Joaquin was sure of it.

In an unusual bout of affection, reserved usually for Tomas or Mallory, or of course Aurélie,  Joaquin put an arm around Sylvie’s slim shoulders.  He had no idea what she was thinking about, of her dark and morbid thoughts, as he guided her along.  

“Here we are,” he said, arriving at a copse of soft long grass and a mossy log.  It was in the sun - the perfect place to bask in the warmth, as fire-attuned loved.  “Stay here, and I’ll be back with the draught, as well as some extra supplies.”

∞

Joaquin’s words washed over her, soothing even as their conversation turned to such uncomfortable questions. “It is good, that you found her again. Of course you did,” Sylvie smiled faintly at the pair of them. She’d lost herself in the fog like her friend lost María, and wasn’t so hopeful that same self would be found so easily.

And wasn’t that what she was doing, questioning the mysteries that plagued her and leading whatever shreds of self she had left to madness? If Joaquin was right, the key was acceptance - accepting all the things she’d lost, all of the ways she had to be on the island that challenged everything she knew so far. A monstrous key for a monstrous door, but at least her friend could give her a boost so she might see through the keyhole and into the other side. 

“Nothing in life is fair,” she said sadly, “I learned that a long time ago, even before I came here." The island made it glaringly obvious, more than it had ever been, but Sylvie knew even as a child that the Universe handed out good and bad things seemingly at random. It was the only way she learned to make sense of her often nonsensical existence. 

Maybe her wrecked tent would have been upsetting, if she didn’t have more important things on her mind. She’d slept outside for the past couple of days and didn’t see the harm in a few more, least of all with Joaquin looking out for her. If there was one person who knew the best spot to lay and rest for a while, it was him.

Sylvie leaned in, choosing to allow Joaquin’s arm around her shoulders become a source of comfort instead of a weight to bear. Affection was rare to come by, at least in her experience, but she was starting to consider that a result of her own tendency to self-isolate and not an inherent trait of the island itself. 

—oOo—

“Sylvie!” 

Teak came pelting down off the Leander, hopping half of the gangplank in his haste to get to the girl. He was a little bit horrified with himself over just how glad he was to see her, but he didn’t want to think about that. He just wanted to get to her before she passed by and away again, to … where ever it was she’d been. It occurred to Teak that he hadn’t seen Sylvie around for quite a while. Which was understandable on his part since his kid brother had shown up out of the blue, but odd on her part. 

He came skidding to a stop next to her in the sand, then shifted himself in front of her. “Hey, you haven’t been around much, have you? Laying low? You chose a good time for it. This place has been bonkers lately, with the fog and everything. Just big general weirdness. Not the kind of weirdness you’d like! Super hardcore weirdness.”

Teak took a breath, looking Sylvie up and down finally. “Are you okay?” he asked, more slowly. “You look sort of – don’t take this the wrong way, I know girls get really touchy about this kind of thing, but you don’t look great. As in health-wise. You still look pretty.”

He gave her a brief, flickering smile, and moved as if he’d like to hug her, but held off with a questioning look. “Okay to touch?” Teak asked. “I missed you. Aaaaaaand I’ve sort of got a problem I think you could help me with.” He hovered there, arms in an outstretched semi-circle to see if she’d allow the hug or not.

∞

Sylvie winced at the sound of her own name, balling her hands into anxious fists as she turned to look but relaxing immediately once she saw who was calling out to her. Teak’s figure sprinting towards her came as a strange relief, but not an unwelcome one.

He was a bit of a nuisance, sure, but he had this all-encompassing way about him and - well, Sylvie figured she could stand to be encompassed, just a little. What was that he said to her one time, about distractions? The concept was growing on her, far more attractive than keeping herself pressed right up against all of the things that made her ill.

"Hey,” she plastered a smile on her face, denying herself the comfort of playing quiet and shy even though it was hard to get a word in edgewise, “I’m okay. Thanks, I guess.” Sylvie scratched at her temple, squinting down at her feet before willing herself to meet Teak’s gaze, “It was weird, wasn’t it? I got lost for a bit, after the fog, but I found my way back.” At least she was trying to find her way back. To what, she wasn’t sure.

She braced herself for a hug, slightly taken aback when he gave her the option to back out. “It’s fine,” Sylvie assured him, looping her arms around his back and resting her head on his chest for a couple of seconds before peeling herself away. It wasn’t as uncomfortable as she feared.

“What kind of problem?” she asked, glossing over the fact that he apparently missed her and doing her best not to sound too suspicious of his motives, “And you think I can help?” Knowing Teak even as little as she did, Sylvie imagined he was facing a number of problems both self-imposed and not - but how she could be useful was impossible to guess.