Stuck in an Island with Twelve Beautiful Women
Chapter 1603

Chapter 1603: Chapter 1603

They didn’t return to their home as they had left it. The moss still hummed beneath their feet. The trees leaned inward, listening. But the light - oh, the light had changed. No longer the dreamy gold of perpetual desire. Now it was deeper, richer, tinged with violet, like the hour between sunset and stars. The air smelled of wet blossoms and something faintly metallic, like stormlight. Even the fire pit they had left behind had grown over with thick, blooming vines, pale blue flowers pulsing faintly like they breathed.

The women moved around Jude without speaking. Sophie adjusted her wrap, securing her sleeping twins against her chest. Susan and Grace each held their children close, exchanging glances thick with unspoken truth. Rose walked ahead, her steps sure, her gaze scanning the camp as though expecting change, perhaps even challenge. Lucy came last, brushing her fingers against Jude’s arm as they passed into the heart of their grove.

Everything was familiar.

Nothing was the same.

Jude stood at the center, every breath full of too much - too much love, too much knowing, too much of the island living inside him now. His body still bore the silver traces of their crossing. The others did too. Their skin had become something new, more than flesh. They radiated - not just beauty or heat - but promise. And warning.

Lucy circled behind him, her lips brushing the edge of his jaw. "There’s something under the moss now."

He turned to her. "What do you mean?"

She closed her eyes, listening. "It’s... deeper. Like roots have reached places they weren’t allowed to before. The island isn’t just watching anymore. It’s growing."

Emma crouched at the fire pit, brushing vines aside. Her fingertips grazed the dirt, and she frowned. "It left something."

Jude moved to her side and knelt. Where the vines had been, the fire pit’s base now cradled something smooth, pale as pearl. He dug gently around it. It wasn’t stone. It wasn’t bone.

It was an egg.

Rose knelt beside him, her breath catching. "That’s not from us."

"No," Emma whispered. "That’s from her ."

The silver woman.

Jude lifted it in his palms. It was warm. Throbbing faintly. A pulse in sync with his own.

Sophie hovered beside him. "Do we... hatch it?"

"I don’t think it needs us to," Zoey said, already backing away.

From the trees, a wind curled inward. It tasted like salt and stars, like moonlight filtered through grief.

And the egg cracked.

The sound was soft. Wet. Then the shell dissolved between Jude’s fingers, leaving a tiny, translucent creature in its place - no larger than a bird, but coiled in perfect spirals of silver and gold. It blinked up at him with wide, lidless eyes.

Lucy gasped. "It’s... looking at you."

Rose reached out, one finger brushing the creature’s spine. It chirped, high and clear, and the trees rippled as if they understood.

Emma stepped forward. "It’s not a monster."

"No," Jude said, mesmerized. "It’s a messenger."

It unfolded slowly, tiny wings spreading, gossamer-thin and shimmering. Its chest glowed faintly, and when it fluttered into the air, the light inside it pulsed.

Not randomly.

In rhythm.

A pattern.

The heartstone’s beat.

Susan stepped forward, her child cradled to her chest. "It wants us to follow."

The creature darted forward, hovering just above the moss, waiting.

And then it flew.

They followed it.

Not out of obedience.

Out of trust.

It led them deeper into the island’s center, through thickets that parted like breath, over streams that shone silver in the twilight, and into a valley none of them had ever seen. The air here was different. Not just fresh, not just magical - it was sacred.

At the heart of the valley stood a tree.

Unlike the heart-tree before. This one was darker. Not black, but deep violet, its bark veined with glowing blue. The leaves shimmered, not with pollen or light - but with memory. Images flickered on their surfaces as the breeze touched them - faces, hands, lovers, children, moments.

Stella gasped. "It remembers everything."

Natalie knelt near its roots. "She said we had to plant what we saw."

Rose took Jude’s hand. "This is where we do it."

Without speaking, the circle formed again.

Jude stepped to the base of the tree.

The creature perched on his shoulder and sang.

Its voice vibrated through his ribs.

Lucy stepped forward first, kissed him softly, and laid her hand on the tree.

Then Emma.

Then Zoey.

Then Grace, Stella, Scarlet, Susan, Sophie, Natalie, and Rose.

All around him.

Their eyes closed.

Their bodies glowing.

Jude reached deep - not into the ground - but into himself. And he gave .

The visions. The desire. The fear. The future.

He poured it into the tree.

And the tree responded.

Its branches pulsed.

Its roots uncoiled and twisted lovingly around their feet.

The valley trembled.

And from the highest bough, a fruit began to form.

It grew quickly - round, heavy, dripping golden sap.

The air turned thick.

Heavy.

Expectant.

Rose opened her eyes. "It’s a choice."

"What is?" Lucy asked, already knowing.

Jude looked at the fruit.

"It’s the next step."

They stood in silence.

One bite.

One act.

And everything would shift again.

Emma looked at him. "Do we take it?"

Jude stepped forward.

And reached.

The fruit was warm against his palm, its skin pulsing faintly like a heart wrapped in golden light. It weighed more than it should have - dense with meaning, with consequence. Around him, the women held their breath, their eyes trained on the way his fingers curled around it, how his chest rose and fell in rhythm with the valley’s hush. The tiny silver creature on his shoulder sang no longer. It simply watched.

Jude looked at each of them, one by one. Lucy, radiant and wide-eyed, her lips parted with a hunger that wasn’t just desire - it was longing. Emma, fierce and alert, as if already preparing for what would come next. Zoey, arms crossed, but her posture softening, vulnerable. Grace, calm and open. Stella, trembling slightly.