Chapter 1169
Jude sank to his knees, the weight of it all crashing down on him, his breath coming hard and fast. Sophie knelt beside him, wrapping her arms around him, holding him as the storm within him broke.
"We’ll find a way," she whispered, her voice fierce and sure. "We’ll bring her back. I promise."
And Jude clung to that promise, because it was all they had left.
The night air hung heavy with rain and salt, the storm’s fury now a distant rumble that echoed across the restless sea. Jude stayed on his knees, his fingers dug into the wet earth, as if holding on to the island itself could keep him from breaking apart. Sophie stayed with him, her arms tight around his shoulders, her warmth the only steady thing in a world that felt like it might crumble beneath them at any moment. The others stood silent in the dark, their faces pale and streaked with rain, their breaths visible in the cold air.
No one spoke. There was nothing to say.
Finally, Jude lifted his head, his hair plastered to his face, his eyes red but clear. The cliffs stretched out before him, the sea crashing far below, and he thought of Rose, of her voice, her touch, the way she had looked at him in those first quiet days on the island. The woman he had loved, the woman who had loved him back, was lost somewhere behind that terrible light. But she wasn’t gone. He refused to believe she was truly gone.
"We’re not giving up," he said, his voice low but sure, cutting through the silence. "We can’t. We won’t."
Sophie nodded, brushing wet strands of hair from his face. "No, we won’t. We’ll find her. We’ll save her."
Lucy sheathed her blade, her jaw tight with determination. "We’ll fight whatever’s got her. Whatever this island throws at us, we’ll fight it together."
The others murmured their agreement, their fear tempered by resolve. They had survived this long. They would survive what came next.
They turned from the cliffs, making their way back through the forest, the ground slick and treacherous beneath their feet. The trees seemed to watch them, silent and ancient, the night filled with the soft sounds of dripping leaves and the distant call of some unseen creature. The island felt changed now, as if the storm had awakened something, or perhaps unleashed it.