Chapter 1: The Torn Beneath
The Thorn Beneath
The sun had dropped behind the ridge, but the heat hadn’t left.
Luce stood at the edge of the dry creekbed, her boots dusted white. The wind tugged at her shirt, whispering through the mesquite grove like it had somewhere else to be. But she stayed still. Something in the air felt held—like a breath the land hadn’t exhaled yet.
She knelt beneath the oldest tree, one with bark like burn scars and thorns black as iron. Her fingers hovered near the roots, just above a strange spiral of cracked earth. That’s when she heard it:
“Child of ash. Come closer.”
The voice wasn’t out loud. But it wasn’t hers either.
She blinked. The air shimmered—like heat mirage, but colder. She looked around. No one. No movement. Just her pulse, too loud in her ears.
Then it came again, velvet and knowing:
“You’ve felt it, haven’t you? That flutter beneath your ribs. That itch in your bones. That’s me, little spark.”
Her mouth was dry.
“I’m not… I’m not supposed to talk to anything here,” she said softly, though no one had told her that. Not really.
“They warned you away, didn’t they? Your mother with her soft hands. Your father with his shadowed eyes. But they never told you what you are.”
The tree’s thorn caught the last bit of sunlight, glowing like coal.
“You’re the bloom that never opened. The ember that never caught. But I can teach you. Unlock you.”
Luce stepped back. Her heel snapped a twig, and the sound felt too loud, like it cracked something inside her. She turned and ran, the voice chasing her—not through sound, but through blood.
“You’ll come back, Luce. All daughters do.”
