Chapter 1 – The Lure
The knock came at 1:47 AM, sharp and impatient, the kind that said the person on the other side had already decided the hour didn't matter.
Evan Clarke didn't even bother sighing. He knew exactly who it was.
He rolled out of bed, bare feet hitting the cold parquet of his seventh-floor walk-up in the 11th arrondissement. The apartment was small—kitchenette bleeding into living room bleeding into bedroom—and the hallway light had burned out three weeks ago. He navigated by memory and the faint blue glow from his laptop screen saver, still open to a half-finished spreadsheet he hadn't touched in days.
The door opened before the second knock finished.
Miles Rowan stood there like he'd just stepped out of a wind tunnel. Dark curls wild, camera bag slung across his chest, eyes bright with the particular manic energy that Evan had learned—over fifteen years—to both dread and depend on.
"You're awake," Miles said, relieved, as though this were a surprise.
"I am now." Evan leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed over his faded Radiohead T-shirt. "You know normal people text first, right?"
"Texts don't have the same urgency." Miles pushed past him without waiting for an invitation, already unzipping the camera bag as he moved toward the tiny dining table that doubled as Evan's desk. "I need to show you something. Sit."
Evan closed the door. "It's almost two in the morning, Miles."
"Exactly. Perfect time for life-changing revelations." Miles pulled out a thick stack of printouts, a tablet, and what looked like three different topographic maps. He spread them across the table like a general preparing for war. "Vai’lera. You've heard of it."
Evan rubbed his face. "The island no one's allowed on unless they're married. Yes. You've mentioned it. Approximately four hundred times."
"Not married-married. Bonded. There's a difference." Miles tapped one of the maps, where a small green speck sat isolated in the middle of the Indian Ocean. "Closed to outsiders since the 1970s. No airstrip, no harbor big enough for anything commercial. The only way in is through their own boats, and they only let in couples. Legally recognized couples. Or ritually bonded ones. Either way—"
"—no singles," Evan finished. "I remember the lecture."
Miles grinned, the grin that had gotten them arrested in Prague, lost in the Atlas Mountains, and once—memorably—chased by security dogs in Lisbon. "But here's the part you haven't heard yet." He swiped open the tablet and turned it toward Evan.
The screen showed grainy drone footage: a lagoon at twilight, water glowing soft violet, vines pulsing with their own inner light like slow-motion lightning. Then the camera panned up—trees dripping with bioluminescent orchids, flowers opening and closing in patterns that looked almost coordinated. A pair of large, cat-like creatures moved in perfect tandem along a branch, tails entwined. Everything about the place screamed untouched, impossible, alive in a way no nature documentary had ever captured.
Evan felt something tighten in his chest. Not quite envy. Closer to hunger.
"Footage from a fishing boat that got too close last year," Miles said quietly. "They confiscated the memory card, but the captain leaked stills to a dark-web forum before they caught him. This is real, Ev. And no one's been inside. Not properly. Not with a proper camera."
Evan looked from the screen to Miles's face. The excitement there was familiar—bright, reckless, contagious. But underneath it, something else flickered. Something quieter. Almost desperate.
"You want to go," Evan said. It wasn't a question.
"I need to go." Miles leaned forward, elbows on the table, voice dropping. "This isn't another weekend trip to shoot ruins or chase auroras. This is… the last place like this on Earth. If I can get even twenty minutes of usable interior footage—real, ground-level, no filters—the galleries will fight over it. The networks. Hell, National Geographic would probably frame it. I could finally stop scraping by on stock licenses and one-off assignments."
Evan studied him. Miles had been chasing the perfect shot since college, when he'd sold his first photo to a local paper for fifty euros and declared himself "professionally immortal." Fifteen years later, he was still immortal in theory—still sleeping on couches, still eating instant noodles when rent was due, still convinced the next image would be the one that changed everything.
"And the married part?" Evan asked.
Miles's grin turned sly. "We fake it."
Evan laughed once, short and disbelieving. "You're serious."
"Dead serious." Miles pulled one last sheet from the stack—a very official-looking certificate template, half-filled in ballpoint pen. Names: Miles Rowan and Evan Clarke. Date: three weeks ago. A fake notary stamp in red ink. "We print a couple copies, laminate them, maybe add a photo of us looking couple-y. Or—better—we do their ritual thing. The Vine Union. From what I read, it's quick. Ten minutes, some chanting, a little blood. They accept it on the spot. No paperwork trail back here."
Evan stared at the certificate. It looked like a prop from a bad rom-com. "Blood."
"Just a finger prick. Symbolic."
"Symbolic," Evan repeated flatly.
Miles reached across the table and gripped Evan's wrist—not hard, just enough to make the point. "We've been each other's plus-one for everything since we were nineteen. Weddings, funerals, hospital visits, that time we got stranded in the Dolomites with no phone signal. If anyone can sell being a couple, it's us."
Evan didn't pull away. He looked at Miles's hand on his skin, then up at his face. The apartment was quiet except for the distant rumble of a night bus on Rue de la Roquette.
"You're asking me to lie to an entire isolated culture," he said slowly, "so you can take pictures."
"I'm asking you to come on the adventure of a lifetime," Miles corrected. "With me. Like always."
Evan exhaled through his nose. He thought about the last six months: the quiet apartment, the job he'd quit in a blaze of burnout, the messages from his ex that he still hadn't deleted. The way every day felt like wading through fog.
He looked back at the tablet. The violet lagoon still glowed on the screen, patient, waiting.
"Fine," he said at last. "Show me the rest of your insane plan."
Miles's whole face lit up like he'd just won something.
Evan felt the corner of his own mouth twitch, against his better judgment.
He was already in.
Evan crossed to the narrow kitchen counter instead, flicked on the single bulb above the sink, and started the ancient espresso machine that had come with the apartment. The machine hissed like it was personally offended by being woken up. Miles watched him with the patient amusement of someone who knew exactly how long it took Evan to process anything that smelled like permanent change.
“Coffee at two AM?” Miles said. “You’re really committing to this.”
“I’m committing to caffeine,” Evan corrected. “The rest is still under review.”
He pulled two mismatched mugs from the cupboard—one chipped white porcelain with a faded Eiffel Tower, the other a heavy black thing Miles had left here two years ago after crashing for a week. Evan poured without asking if Miles wanted any. He always did.
Miles waited until the steam curled between them before speaking again.
“You remember the summer after sophomore year?” he asked, voice softer now. “When we drove that rented Fiat all the way to Slovenia because I swore I could get shots of the Soča River at dawn that no one else had?”
Evan leaned back against the counter, mug warming his palms. “I remember the Fiat breaking down in a village with no cell service. And the old woman who fed us štruklji and told us we argued like an old married couple.”
Miles laughed under his breath. “She wasn’t wrong.”
Evan didn’t laugh back. He took a sip, scalding his tongue on purpose. The burn grounded him.
“That was nine years ago,” he said. “We were twenty. We thought everything was temporary. Jobs, cities, people.”
Miles’s expression shifted—something careful entering his eyes. “And now?”
Evan set the mug down harder than he meant to. “Now I’m twenty-nine, Miles. I have exactly one plant that’s somehow still alive despite me, a savings account that’s mostly IOUs to myself, and an inbox full of recruiters asking why I left a six-figure job without notice. Temporary stopped feeling romantic somewhere around the third time I had to explain to my mother why I wasn’t ‘settling down yet.’”
Miles didn’t flinch. He never did when Evan got sharp. Instead he reached for his own mug, cradling it like it was evidence.
“I know,” he said quietly. “I know about the breakup. About how you haven’t answered her texts in three months. About how you’ve been sleeping with the lights on because the quiet feels too loud.”
Evan’s jaw tightened. He hadn’t told Miles about the lights. Hadn’t told anyone. But Miles had always noticed the things Evan tried to bury.
“That’s not why I’m hesitating,” Evan said.
“Then tell me why.”
Evan looked at the spread on the table—the maps, the stills, the ridiculous certificate. Then back at Miles.
“Because this isn’t just another reckless weekend. This is you asking me to pretend we’re something we’re not, in a place where pretending might get us in deeper than we can climb out of. And I’m tired of pretending, Miles. About a lot of things.”
The words hung there, heavier than he’d intended.
Miles set his mug down slowly. For once he didn’t rush to fill the silence with jokes or plans. He just looked at Evan—really looked—like he was seeing something for the first time.
“I’m not asking you to pretend forever,” he said. “I’m asking you to come with me. Like we always have. The rest—the couple thing—it’s just the door. Once we’re through it, it’s you and me against whatever the island throws at us. Same as always.”
Evan exhaled, long and slow. “You make it sound simple.”
“It is simple.” Miles leaned forward again, elbows on the table. “You’re the only person I’d trust with this. Not because you’re good at lying. Because you’re good at staying. When everything else falls apart, you stay.”
Evan felt the words land somewhere under his ribs, sharp and familiar.
He thought about the night after his father’s funeral—Miles showing up at three a.m. with takeout and a bottle of cheap whiskey, not saying much, just sitting on the floor beside him until dawn. Thought about the time in Morocco when food poisoning hit them both and Miles refused to leave the bathroom doorway until Evan could stand again. Thought about a hundred smaller moments, stacked like stones across fifteen years.
He looked at the tablet again. The violet lagoon pulsed softly on loop.
Evan picked up the fake certificate. The notary stamp was crooked. His name looked wrong next to Miles’s in ballpoint.
“If we do this,” he said, “we do it properly. No half-assed paper. We learn the ritual. We don’t get caught lying on day one.”
Miles’s face split into that reckless, sun-bright grin.
“Deal.”
Evan held up a hand. “And if it goes sideways—if the island figures us out, or the vines eat us, or whatever nightmare ecology they’ve got in there—you don’t get to say ‘I told you it would be fine.’”
Miles raised three fingers in mock solemnity. “Scout’s honor. I will take full responsibility for our inevitable dramatic deaths.”
Evan snorted despite himself. “You were never a scout.”
“Exactly. My word means nothing. So you know I’m serious.”
Evan stared at him for a long beat. Then he reached across the table and took the tablet, swiping through the stills himself. The bioluminescent orchids opened and closed like breathing lungs. The water looked like liquid moonlight.
He handed the tablet back.
“Fine,” he said. “But you’re buying the plane tickets. And the fake wedding rings. And anything else we need to sell this.”
Miles was already on his feet, gathering the papers like they were sacred texts. “Already on it. There’s a jeweler in the Marais who does custom bands cheap. We’ll say we’re eloping. Very romantic.”
Evan groaned. “I hate you.”
“You love me,” Miles shot back, already halfway to the door. “I’ll text you the flight options by morning. Get some sleep, Clarke. We’ve got an island to crash.”
The door clicked shut behind him.
Evan stood alone in the kitchen, the espresso machine ticking as it cooled. He looked at his left wrist—bare, unmarked—and imagined a vine curling there, green and alive.
He turned off the light.
But he didn’t go back to bed right away.
Instead he sat at the table, opened his laptop, and started searching “Vai’lera Vine Union ritual.”
The screen glowed blue against the dark.
He told himself it was research.
He almost believed it.
By 9:17 AM the next morning, the tiny table in Evan’s apartment looked like the aftermath of a wedding-themed crime scene.
Two cheap titanium bands sat in the center like evidence—plain, matte, bought from a tourist-trap jeweler who’d winked and said “congratulations on the elopement, messieurs.” Miles had paid cash and called it “method acting.” Evan had called it “twenty-seven euros I’ll never see again.”
Miles was currently wearing his like a trophy, spinning it on his finger while he scrolled through a spreadsheet titled “Vai’lera Survival Lies Checklist.”
Evan stood at the kitchen counter, arms crossed, staring at the second ring like it might bite him.
“I’m not wearing that twenty-four-seven,” he said.
“You have to,” Miles replied without looking up. “The guardians check for matching bands during the arrival scan. It’s in the leaked forum post from 2022. Apparently they have this creepy glowing vine thing that lights up if the rings don’t match the tattoos.”
Evan pinched the bridge of his nose. “There’s a glowing vine that fact-checks wedding rings. Of course there is.”
“Welcome to Vai’lera. Where even the foliage is judgmental.”
Evan finally picked up the band. It was surprisingly light. He slid it onto his left ring finger, flexed his hand, then immediately started twisting it like it was burning him.
“Feels like I’m wearing a tiny handcuff.”
“That’s the spirit,” Miles said cheerfully. “Now say something couple-y.”
Evan deadpanned: “I hate you and I want a divorce.”
“Perfect. Save that for the renewal ceremony.”
Miles closed the laptop with a flourish and stood up, stretching like he’d just won a marathon. “Okay, packing list. Two lightweight cameras, extra batteries, waterproof cases, the good drone—I’m not risking the cheap one on glowing carnivorous plants. First-aid kit, water purifier, protein bars, bug spray that actually works—”
“Condoms?” Evan interrupted, deadpan.
Miles froze mid-sentence, then burst out laughing so hard he almost knocked over the coffee mug.
“Jesus, Clarke. No. We’re not that committed to the bit.”
“Just checking. Wouldn’t want the island to think we’re unprepared.”
Miles wiped his eyes. “You’re the worst fake husband ever.”
“Good. Means I’m authentic.”
They spent the next hour turning Evan’s living room into a staging area. Miles dumped the contents of his duffel onto the floor—random lenses, a crumpled rain shell, three different pairs of hiking socks that had clearly never met a washing machine. Evan methodically sorted everything into piles: “essential,” “maybe,” “why do you even own this?”
When he held up a neon-green fanny pack with a cartoon sloth on it, Miles snatched it back like it was sacred.
“That’s my lucky pack. It survived the Dolomites.”
“It survived because no self-respecting bear would eat anything that ugly.”
Miles clutched it to his chest. “You wound me.”
Evan rolled his eyes and moved on to the fake certificate. He’d spent twenty minutes last night doctoring it in Photoshop—better fonts, straighter notary stamp, a slightly less crooked date. Now it looked almost believable. Almost.
He held it up to the light. “If they X-ray this thing, we’re done.”
“They don’t X-ray. They do the vine ritual. We prick fingers, say the words, done. The tattoos appear, the guardians nod, we’re in.”
Evan stared at him. “You’re way too calm about blood-mingling with a magical plant.”
“It’s symbolic blood. Probably. Like 80% symbolic.”
“Great. I feel so much better.”
Miles grinned and tossed a protein bar at Evan’s head. Evan caught it one-handed without looking.
“See? Reflexes like a married man already.”
Evan threw it back harder. “Reflexes like a man who’s about to murder his best friend.”
They bickered through the rest of the packing—Miles trying to sneak in an extra lens he didn’t need, Evan vetoing the sloth fanny pack (it stayed), both of them laughing at how ridiculous the whole setup was.
By late afternoon the bags were zipped, the tickets booked (Paris → Réunion Island → private charter boat to Vai’lera’s outer reef), and the fake rings were reluctantly on their fingers.
Miles stood in the doorway, duffel over one shoulder, looking more alive than Evan had seen him in months.
“Two weeks from now,” he said, “we’ll be ankle-deep in glowing water, shooting footage no one’s ever seen. And you’ll be complaining the whole time.”
Evan adjusted the straps on his own pack. “I’ll be complaining because you’ll have dragged me into a death trap disguised as a honeymoon.”
“Exactly. Classic us.”
Evan hesitated for half a second—long enough for the reality to settle in his stomach like cold coffee. Then he shrugged.
“Let’s go before I change my mind and flush the rings down the toilet.”
Miles laughed, bright and reckless. “Too late, Clarke. You’re stuck with me.”
Evan followed him into the hallway, locking the door behind them.
He glanced down at the titanium band on his finger one last time.
It still felt like a tiny handcuff.
But for some reason, it didn’t feel entirely wrong.
The taxi to Charles de Gaulle smelled like wet wool and someone else’s fast-food fries. Miles sat shotgun—because of course he did—chatting up the driver in broken French about how “Paris traffic is basically performance art.” Evan slouched in the back seat beside two overstuffed duffels, staring out the window at the blur of sodium lights and late-night delivery scooters.
His phone buzzed. A text from Miles, sent from three feet away.
Miles: You nervous?
Evan: No.
Miles: Liar. Your leg is doing the bouncy thing.
Evan: That’s because your knee keeps hitting mine every time the driver brakes.
Miles: Classic married couple energy. We’re nailing this already.
Evan rolled his eyes so hard it hurt, but he couldn’t stop the snort that escaped. He typed back:
Evan: If we get caught, I’m telling them you forced me. Stockholm syndrome.
Miles: Please. You’d miss me too much in prison.
Evan pocketed the phone without replying. He looked down at the titanium band on his finger again. In the dim cab light, it looked almost normal. Like something people actually wore on purpose.
The airport was its usual chaos: queues that moved like molasses, security agents who seemed personally offended by liquids over 100 ml, and a family of six arguing loudly about whose carry-on had the passports. Miles breezed through check-in like he’d done this a thousand times (he had), flashing the fake certificate at the airline desk with the confidence of a man who believed his own lies.
The clerk barely glanced at it. “Bon voyage, messieurs.”
Evan muttered under his breath, “We’re doomed.”
Miles grinned. “Optimism, Clarke. It’s free.”
They made it to the gate with forty minutes to spare. Miles immediately beelined for a coffee kiosk while Evan claimed two plastic chairs and guarded the bags like they were national treasures. When Miles returned, he handed over a paper cup the size of a small bucket.
“Double espresso. No sugar. Because you’re already bitter enough.”
Evan took it. “Thanks. I think.”
They sat in companionable silence for a minute, watching passengers trickle by—business types on phones, backpackers with neck pillows, a couple in matching hoodies holding hands like they’d invented romance.
Miles nudged Evan’s elbow. “See that? That’s what we’re going for. But less… synchronized swimming, more… us.”
Evan glanced at the couple. “If we hold hands like that, I’m pushing you into the lagoon.”
“Noted. Hand-holding only when vines demand it.”
Another beat of quiet. Then Miles’s voice dropped, losing some of its usual bounce.
“You sure about this? Last chance to bail. I can go solo, fake a tragic widower story or something.”
Evan looked at him sideways. “You’d last about twelve hours before you got lost in a glowing forest and started yelling my name for backup.”
Miles laughed, short and genuine. “Probably.”
Evan took a sip of coffee. It was scalding and perfect. “Besides,” he said, “who else is going to stop you from eating mystery island fruit and turning into a bioluminescent squirrel?”
Miles leaned back, stretching his legs out. “Fair. You’re my designated adult supervision.”
“And you’re my designated chaos generator. Balance.”
The boarding call crackled over the speakers—first in French, then English. Miles stood, slinging his duffel over one shoulder.
“Showtime.”
Evan rose more slowly. He adjusted his pack, checked his passport for the third time in ten minutes, then looked at Miles.
“If this goes sideways—”
“It won’t.”
“But if it does—”
Miles cut him off with a grin. “Then we improvise. Like always.”
Evan exhaled. “Like always.”
They joined the line. Miles ahead, Evan right behind. When they scanned their boarding passes, the gate agent smiled politely.
“Enjoy your honeymoon, gentlemen.”
Miles didn’t miss a beat. “Thanks. We’re very excited.”
Evan kicked the back of Miles’s shoe. Hard.
Miles didn’t even flinch. Just kept walking, shoulders shaking with silent laughter.
As they stepped onto the jetway, the cool recycled air hit them like a slap. Evan glanced back once—at the terminal lights, the city beyond, the life they were leaving behind for two weeks of glowing insanity.
Then he looked forward.
Miles was already halfway down the tunnel, turning back with that reckless, sun-bright grin.
“Come on, fake husband. Adventure’s waiting.”
Evan shook his head, but he was smiling now—small, reluctant, real.
“Shut up and walk faster. I’m not missing the in-flight snacks because of you.”
Miles laughed, loud enough to echo off the metal walls.
And just like that, they were gone—two best friends, one ridiculous lie, and an island that had no idea what was coming.
