Paragon - Book I

The Approach

Lethinor drifts into view on the third day. Allayria can just make out its shadow in the distance, and even that dark sliver sends ice through her heart. Something about it seems to draw the eye, and she can't decide if it's a simple matter of what she's heard and what they think is hidden there, or if it is something else entirely. Her appetite wanes, and she finds herself picking at the frayed edges of her sleeves. She doesn't feel comfortable with her back to it.

Sea water sprays across her face and she shakes her head against it, as if to throw off a chill.

Old tales told to scare little kids, she tells herself, watching the outline shifting in and out of view with the rise and fall of the waves.

But she is not so certain, and Iaves at least seems to feel similarly. He too casts the island dark looks and secludes himself in the mess hall with Rex who paces, blue eyes alert and searching, ears tucked back flat against her head.

Ben, of course, feels none of it. He steers toward that lonely island with a clear gaze, untouched by whatever seems to be coming over the others.

Mist clings against the rolling, deep blue waves. The water is icy when it splashes up over the side of the boat, flecking their faces and slopping over the rails. The island seems to grow larger, but never clearer, and Allayria can see some structure rising up near the tip, but cannot make out exactly what it is.

They have gone quiet. Even Rex has stopped pacing now. They are all watching the island approach.

And that's what it really is—it is coming for them, and not the other way around. For all of its stillness, there seems to be something alive about it, and Allayria doesn't like it.

Turn the boat around, she wants to say. Let's go back. We should go back.

But Ben isn't going back, and Allayria isn't leaving without Ben. So she faces it, the hulking slab of gray rock, the monster made out of childhood dreams.

They beach on the west side of the island, on the small, razor-thin strip of sand that peaks up out of the dark water. Meg cracks the rock wall apart and Allayria sinks the anchor into it, feeling the metal slide into the coffin of cold, wet stone.

They each sling a pack of the essentials on their backs as their feet hit solid ground once more. From the narrow beach the island seems to rise up, a looming tangle of crumbling rock and green—moss, trees, and vines.

She's thinking it was wise to bring the rope and hook when Iaves points to a small opening in the underbrush.

"It looks like a trail," he says.

They move closer and it is—or, perhaps, it once was. Man-laid cobblestone can be seen beneath the slow crawl of vegetation, and a stone pillar lies off to the side, embraced in a thick web of creepers.

"Let's grab a few more packs of food," Ben says. "It may take us a day to get to the entrance."

They load up once more, and then begin the painstaking climb. It goes slowly: the rocks are slick to the touch and the mist is everywhere, hanging low around them, hiding their surroundings in blurred, swirling shadow. A breeze plays through the trees, making their indistinct forms move strangely in the corners of Allayria's eyes. Iaves' hand is clammy when Allayria clasps it, pulling him up over a ledge, and he seems to be breathing harder than the climb warranted. But then again, so is she.

What she really can't adapt to is the quietness. In as thickly wooded a place as this, Allayria is accustomed to sounds—birds, squirrels, twigs snapping in the wind. There is no birdsong here, no rustle of leaves, no chirp of insects.