Chapter
One
ASH
Heat sits low over the valley, pressing everything flat.
The fence line hums beneath my palm as I check the tension wire. Ordinary current. Nothing unusual. The kind of sound you stop hearing after a while.
Martin Reyes rides a few yards behind me, quiet as the land itself. He doesn’t ask questions. Never has. Just watches the mountains like he’s waiting for them to answer something.
The saddle creaks beneath me, leather hot from the sun, reins rough in my palm.
Sweat and sage dust the air.
The Starborn Range cuts the horizon in jagged blue shadow. Even at midday, the peaks hold their darkness too long.
Government signs line the boundary fence.
Restricted
No Trespassing
Photography Prohibited
Use of Deadly Force Authorized
The red paint has faded under years of sun. I’ve replaced three of them myself after hunters used them for target practice.
The signs lean slightly toward the valley, as if even metal prefers distance from the peaks.
Beyond them, the air shimmers—not with heat, but with absence. The sky above the Starborn Range is the same hard blue as everywhere else, yet birds never cross it.
A flock of starlings lifts from the sagebrush in sudden black motion, spiraling upward in a tight murmur. They wheel once, twice, then split cleanly around the Range like stone parting water.
None of them cross. They never do.
Martin watches them. Says nothing.
Neither do I.
The hum hits without warning. Not from the fence. From me.
A sharp pulse blooms beneath my skin. Heat races across the glyphs—the mark I was born with, the one outsiders mistake for ink—burning like a brand driven to bone.
I go still.
A raven lands on one of the RESTRICTED signs and cocks its head toward the mountains. Then it takes off. Not toward them, but away.
Always away.
The hum answers.
Martin shifts in the saddle. “You feel that wind?”
“There isn’t any.” My voice stays level.
The pulse hits again. Stronger.
