Lydia the Siren's Arc

Chapter 30 of 37

Lydia woke inside the green room and knew at once that something had changed. The day before, the forest had warned her. Its ring had pushed her back, sharp and cold. Now the same wood cradled her. The roots held her like a mother holds a child. She pressed her hand to the crystal and felt it welcome her. Her strength had returned in the night. She stood without shaking. The hollow ache under her ribs was gone. The crystal fed her the way blood and fear once had, and it asked nothing in return. She turned in a slow circle. The walls of living wood shimmered pink and blue. Crystals grew from the bark of trees pressed close around her, some green, some pale. Why the change, she wondered. Yesterday the grove had feared her hunger. Today it had filled her. She laid her palm flat on a cool root. It pulsed under her skin, steady as breath. She understood. The forest had judged her again and decided she was no longer a danger. She had come to it empty, a woman with no beast left inside. So it took her in. Then she heard him. From far off, past the wall of roots, a voice called her name. Bastion. He had come home to the empty bed and followed her tracks. His voice carried the same warmth that once slipped under her skin, the hum that moved her the way her own song moved men. "Lydia!" it came again, closer now, rough with fear. She ran to the wall and pushed. The roots did not give. "Bastion," she said. "I'm here. I'm inside." She dug her fingers between the coils and pulled. The wood only tightened. It curled over the gaps, sealing them, shutting his voice out. "Let me go," she told the forest. "He's mine. I want to be with him." The roots did not loosen. They drew closer around her, gentle and firm, the way arms shield a child from a storm. She could not understand it. The grove had healed her. Now it would not let her leave the one who healed her heart. It wanted to keep her the way she had once wanted to keep him. Then the crystal made a sound. It was low, pitched so only she could hear it. She knew that sound. It was the same note the crystal had given her the day before, when the whole forest had told her to run. A warning.