She let out a breath and tried to clear her head. “You’re right. It’s the water. So what do we do?”
“Well, I think you’re repelled from it for a reason,” Lunis stated. “Maybe it’s your soul helping you, communicating to stay away. What else do you feel?”
That made sense, Sophia realized as she felt something ancient and wise flowing in her now that she was tuned into it. She closed her eyes and tried to focus on that internal flow. The voice of her soul.
For a moment, she heard multiple voices. Male. Female. Young. Old. It was like a compilation of everyone she’d ever been or known or loved across many lives. It was a chorus of voices, all with different messages that spoke the wisdom of the ages.
Sophia wasn’t sure how she knew that, but she did, with all her being. Then the voices all wove together and didn’t sound like they were speaking words anymore. It was a sound. It was music. It was the sound of water flowing.
Her eyes popped open. “We have to go to the center of the island.”
Chapter Seventeen
Buddha’s Temple was thick with vegetation and appeared to be an unforgiving land full of dangerous animals and thorny plants and sinking mud.
After the first step under the canopy, Sophia and Lunis were cast in darkness. The cacophony of birds squawking in the trees overhead was nearly deafening, and made Sophia have to adjust her hearing. Through the darkness, she spied many yellow eyes blinking at her up ahead.
“We have company.” Sophia felt a little better as they moved away from the Reflective Sea, although she was still irritated at Lunis for no apparent reason.
“Whatever they are, they smell delicious,” Lunis stated in a low voice.
Whatever they were, they moved fast and made little squeaky noises as they darted between large leaves and the undergrowth.
Sophia halted after a few steps and gave Lunis a sideways expression.
“What?” he asked, his tone still not the one she was accustomed to.
She tentatively glanced up at the many colorful tropical birds in the trees that glared down at them. “Do you get the impression that we’re not welcome here?”
“Impression?” Lunis questioned. “The welcome mat has pretty much been ripped out from underneath us. Are you certain we’re supposed to go to the center of this island? Maybe it’s a different one, like the one shaped like a paw or any of the others.”
Sophia closed her eyes and listened again to the chorus of voices deep within her soul. She felt a pulse. Watched in her mind as the voices took shape and wove together like DNA. Heard them sing a song that again was unmistakably the sound of rushing water.
Her eyes snapped open. “We have to go to the center of this island or one of the others, but what we’re looking for is the same on each and our experiences to get there will be the same as well.”
“So there’s no avoiding facing the little beast ahead or getting away from the birds that appear ready to bomb us with poop then,” he groused.
Sophia shook her head. “Or any of the other obstacles that lay after that.”
It was weird how she knew this information and yet, it was something she was absolutely certain of. The islands were all different, like souls, yet they were all the same. They were one. What happened on one affected the other. What lay at the center of one, lay at the center of the others. More poetic than that was the Reflective Sea connected them all—in essence making them one.
Chapter Eighteen
“So do we deal with the birds first or venture toward the yellow-eyed beasts that I don’t think are cuddly little creatures ready to assist us on our journey?” Lunis asked.
“They might be,” she argued. “But I don’t think there’s anything to be done about the birds. They just seem to be throwing us death stares.”
“I could torch them,” Lunis offered.
She shook her head. “I don’t think going on the offensive will do us any favors with the natives. Let’s wait until they make the first move.”
“I’m certain that’s going to involve trying to murder us, but you can hold out for a fruit basket if you so desire.”
She grinned. “I’m an optimist.”
Sophia was grateful that the negative feelings towards Lunis evaporated as they moved farther into the jungle. They’d come on so fast and receded as quickly. Who knew why, but it seemed to have been a test of some sort. Or maybe it was a way to push her farther away from the Reflective Sea.
If Lunis and she hadn’t had that argument, then there wouldn’t have been any need for reflection and she might not have gone within and listened to the voice of her soul. The irony of the sea’s name and this experience wasn’t lost on her.
On Sophia’s next step, a twig cracked under her boot. Suddenly, the loud calls of the bright-colored birds in the tree ceased. The sounds from the yellow-eyed creatures halted. The entire jungle fell silent, but not in a peaceful, “all is well on the prairies” way. More like a, “you’re not welcome and about to pay” way.
Chapter Nineteen
Sophia pulled Inexorabilis from its sheath. She had stalled doing that, not wanting to put the jungle creatures on the defensive. Now this was about self-preservation rather than avoiding offending the natives. And that’s exactly the effect it had.
The birds overhead dove like kamikaze fighter pilots with no regard for their lives, it seemed. This left Sophia no choice but to swing her sword at them and knock them away like fly balls. Lunis opened his mouth and blanketed the canopy with fire.
This did little to deter the suicidal birds. They streaked through the flames, caught on fire, and dive-bombed the dragon. This made Lunis abandon his strategy and use his claws and head to bat the balls of fire to the ground.
Thankfully, the forest was wet enough that the trees didn’t burn for long before the fire extinguished. Being on a burning island would make things much more difficult when Sophia didn’t think she could handle any more complications.
Sharp beaks tore at Sophia’s armor and face. A few times, she felt close to losing an eye. The birds were out for blood and not willing to negotiate. Since there was no reasoning with the murderous avians, Sophia had no choice but to slice through bird after bird until it seemed they’d slaughtered every single one.
Lunis’ claws and tail made quick work of the little feathered monsters. But still, the dragon took quite a bit of damage since he was unable to protect himself from being assaulted from every angle.
There had to have been over a hundred birds, but as Sophia and Lunis stood in the once again quiet jungle, it was hard to count all the bodies that littered the jungle floor. Feathers and beaks and broken birds lay all around them, but for some reason there was no blood, which perplexed both Sophia and Lunis.
A chill ran down the dragonrider’s spine as she looked up at the forest canopy to see it lined with more birds. But then when she brought her chin down, all the ones they’d slain were gone—simply vanished. So not new ones. The same birds.
Well, that’s annoying, Lunis said in her head.
Annoying wasn’t the word I was going to use. Her hands gripped her sword as she backed up to her dragon.