Page 1 of Close By (Kari Blackhorse #1)
The moon hung impossibly large in the Arizona sky, casting the ancient sandstone formations in stark relief against the darkness. Professor Mark Harrington paused to catch his breath, the thin air at this elevation making his chest burn.
This shot will be the centerpiece of the exhibition, he thought, adjusting the weight of the camera equipment on his shoulders.
Stone Memories: Earth’s Hidden History would be his first solo photography exhibition at the university gallery, a perfect complement to his recently submitted tenure package.
After twelve years as an associate professor of geology at Canyon State University, Mark was finally making his mark in both his scientific field and his artistic passion.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. Mark pulled it out, surprised to have even a single bar of reception this far into the canyon lands. A text from Ellie, his seventeen-year-old daughter: “Did you sign my permission slip yet? Mom says you have it.”
Mark cursed under his breath. The form for Ellie’s geology field trip to the Grand Canyon—ironically, a trip he would normally have chaperoned if not for the divorce—sat unsigned on his kitchen counter back in Flagstaff.
He’d meant to scan and email it before leaving, but in his rush to get on the road before sunset, it had slipped his mind.
“I’ll sign it first thing when I get back tomorrow,” he typed, knowing it wasn’t the answer she wanted. “Sorry, kiddo.”
Three dots appeared, then disappeared. No reply. Typical.
Since the divorce, their conversations had become increasingly terse.
His ex-wife, Caroline, claimed it was normal teenage behavior, but Mark knew better.
Before the separation, Ellie had been his shadow, accompanying him on weekend expeditions to collect rock samples and helping him catalog specimens in his home office.
Now she regarded him with the same distant interest she might show a moderately engaging museum exhibit.
He slipped the phone back into his pocket. No point dwelling on it now.
The path narrowed as he climbed higher, loose stones skittering beneath his boots.
The isolation should have been unsettling, but Mark had always found peace in desolate landscapes.
They spoke to him in ways people rarely did—honestly, without pretense or judgment.
Rocks didn’t care that his marriage had dissolved last year, or that his teenage daughter now barely spoke to him during his weekend visits.
Stone didn’t mock the obsessive way he threw himself into work to avoid facing the empty Flagstaff house he now returned to each night.
The divorce had been amicable on paper. In reality, it was the culmination of years of Mark’s gradual withdrawal into his work.
“You’re more married to those rocks than you are to me,” Caroline had finally said one evening, not with anger but with a resignation that hurt far worse.
She wasn’t wrong. The stones had never disappointed him, never changed, never wanted more than he could give.
His department chair, Sylvia Hale, had suggested the photography exhibition as a way to humanize his research for the tenure committee.
“They need to see you’re not just another academic robot,” she’d said.
“Show them the beauty you see in these formations.” What she hadn’t said, but Mark understood perfectly well, was that his publication record, while solid, wasn’t exceptional.
The dramatic photographs might tip the scales in his favor.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
The Navajo guide’s words echoed in Mark’s mind as he navigated a tricky section of the trail. Their argument a week ago had grown heated, something Mark wasn’t proud of.
“I understand your concern,” Mark had said, spreading his topographical maps across the hood of his Jeep at the ranger station. “But I’m not disturbing anything. These are just photographs.”
The guide—a weathered man perhaps in his fifties—had shaken his head firmly. “This place is not for outsiders, especially not at night. Not during Náhásdzáán Yee Adees’ee?ígíí. ”
“The what?” Mark had asked, frustration growing.
“The Walking Earth,” the guide had translated reluctantly. “The time when the boundary thins.”
Mark had forced a patient smile. “Look, I respect your traditions. But I’m a scientist. These formations contain geological data that could advance our understanding of the Mesozoic period. The photographs are just a bonus.”
“Science,” the guide had scoffed. “You think that protects you?”
Their conversation had deteriorated from there.
The guide refused to take him, and the ranger station wouldn’t authorize an overnight permit without a certified guide.
But Mark had spent six months planning this trip, calculating when the moon’s position would perfectly illuminate the unusual oxidation patterns in the rock.
His department chair had already promised the exhibition space for next month.
He couldn’t wait another year.
The guide’s final warning had followed Mark to his car: “The old ones do not sleep during Náhásdzáán Yee Adees’ee?ígíí . They walk between worlds. They hunger.”
Mark had dismissed it. It was either superstitious nonsense or a tale designed to keep tourists away from sacred sites.
He understood the broader context—centuries of archaeologists and scientists had plundered Native lands under the banner of research.
But Mark wasn’t taking anything. Just images. Just light.
So here he was, permit be damned. He’d parked at a public trailhead five miles back and taken this unmarked path using GPS coordinates he’d obtained from satellite imagery. After tonight, he’d apologize to the guide, perhaps donate to a tribal education fund.
But the photographs came first.
The path grew steeper. Mark’s breathing became labored as he pushed himself upward.
He had been in excellent shape once—a rock climber in graduate school, an avid hiker and mountain biker through his thirties.
But the last few years of office work and microwave dinners had taken their toll.
His doctor had warned him about his blood pressure at his last physical, suggesting he “find healthier ways to manage stress than caffeine and overtime.”
A sharp pain lanced through his left knee—an old climbing injury acting up.
Mark paused, setting down his equipment to massage the joint.
He pulled out a prescription bottle, dry-swallowing an anti-inflammatory.
The knee had been giving him trouble for weeks, but he’d been putting off the recommended surgery.
No time for recovery, not with the tenure decision looming and the exhibition to prepare.
He looked up at the darkening sky. Thin clouds were beginning to streak across the moon’s face. Not enough to ruin the shoot, but concerning. The weather report had promised clear skies.
An abrupt gust of wind nearly knocked him off balance. It carried with it a peculiar odor—not the expected desert scents of sage and dust, but something mineral and sharp, like wet clay mixed with copper. Mark frowned. Perhaps there was a storm system moving in that the forecast had missed.
He checked his GPS. Only half a mile to go. He could make it before the clouds became a problem, if they even did. The trail ahead separated into two paths—one continuing upward toward his destination, the other winding down into what appeared to be a narrow slot canyon.
As Mark prepared to continue upward, something caught his eye—a flash of red among the rocks below.
He squinted, trying to make it out in the moonlight.
It appeared to be markings on the canyon wall—pictographs, perhaps, their red ochre pigment still vibrant against the pale sandstone despite what must have been centuries of exposure.
His research instincts kicked in. Undocumented rock art in this area could be significant. A quick detour to photograph it might yield material for a secondary paper—something to strengthen his academic portfolio beyond the exhibition.
Mark checked his watch again. He had time, if he was quick. He adjusted his path, heading down into the slot canyon, camera ready.
The descent was trickier than he’d anticipated. Loose shale slid beneath his boots, and the canyon walls pressed in, blocking much of the moonlight. Mark switched on his headlamp, the narrow beam illuminating a path barely wide enough for his shoulders.
The pictographs were even more impressive up close—a series of angular figures surrounding what appeared to be a central handprint.
Not the typical hunting scenes he’d expected, but something more abstract and unsettling.
The figures seemed to dance around the handprint, their elongated limbs reminiscent of mantis insects.
Mark photographed them methodically, taking notes on his phone about their location and orientations. As he worked, the wind continued to gust through the narrow canyon, creating an eerie whistling sound that made concentration difficult.
When he finally checked his watch again, he cursed. He’d spent nearly twenty minutes examining the pictographs. If he wanted to reach the main formation in time for the optimal moonlight, he’d need to hurry.
The climb back out of the slot canyon was arduous. Mark’s knee screamed in protest, and his breath came in ragged gasps. Sweat soaked through his shirt despite the cool night air. By the time he reached the main trail again, his water bottle was half empty and his time buffer had evaporated.
He pushed onward, ignoring the growing discomfort.
The trail became increasingly unfamiliar—rockfalls had obscured portions of the path, forcing him to scramble over boulders that didn’t appear on his topographical map.
Had there been a recent seismic event? Nothing significant enough to make the news, surely, but perhaps enough to alter the landscape in subtle ways.
The trail opened to a small plateau, and Mark’s breath caught in his throat.
There it stood—the formation locals called Yé’iitsoh Bitsilí , or “Monster’s Hand.
” Five towering columns of red sandstone stretched skyward from the desert floor like gnarled fingers, each one streaked with peculiar blue-black veins of manganese oxide that seemed to pulse in the moonlight.
The sight momentarily banished Mark’s fatigue and unease.
It was even more spectacular than the satellite images had suggested.
The formation’s geological significance was obvious to his trained eye—evidence of unusual mineral deposition patterns that contradicted standard models of the region’s formation.
But its visual impact transcended scientific interest.
It was simply beautiful, in the severe, alien way that only natural wonders could be.
Mark quickly unpacked his equipment, setting up his carbon fiber tripod on the steadiest patch of ground he could find.
The wind had picked up, carrying with it that strange metallic scent, stronger now.
He attached his best Nikon, checking the settings carefully.
First, he’d capture the entire formation with his wide-angle lens, then move to detailed shots of each “finger” as the moonlight shifted.
As he worked, Mark’s phone vibrated again.
Another text from Ellie: “Dad, I need that form by tomorrow morning or I can’t go.
” Guilt stabbed through him. He hadn’t missed the irony that his obsession with photographing geological formations was causing his daughter to miss experiencing them firsthand.
“I’ll call your teacher first thing,” he typed back. “I’ll make it work.” He hesitated, then added, “Love you, kiddo.”
No response.
Mark turned back to his camera, trying to refocus. The clouds were thickening now, threatening to obscure the moon entirely. He needed to work quickly. He snapped several test shots, adjusting his settings to compensate for the changing light conditions.
As he adjusted his aperture for the next series, something prickled at the back of his neck—a sensation of being watched. Mark glanced over his shoulder, seeing nothing but shadows.
Get a grip, he told himself. The guide’s superstitions are getting to you.
Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling. He took a few test shots, the camera’s shutter unnaturally loud in the stillness of the desert night. When he checked the preview screen, his blood chilled. There—at the edge of the frame—was what appeared to be a hunched silhouette among the rocks.
A silhouette that hadn’t been there moments before.
“Hello?” Mark called, his voice swallowed by the vastness around him. “Is someone there?”
No answer but the wind. He squinted into the darkness, trying to locate whatever had appeared in his photograph. Perhaps a trick of the light, a shadow cast by the moving clouds across the moon. But the shape had seemed too solid, too… substantial.
A scraping sound answered him—stone against stone—followed by a low, rhythmic murmuring. Mark squinted into the darkness beyond his equipment. A figure moved between two of the stone fingers, hunched low, head turned in his direction.
Mark’s first thought was that another hiker had found their way to the formation—perhaps a ranger patrolling for permit violations. But no ranger would move in that way, like a coyote stalking its prey.
“This is a public area,” Mark called with more confidence than he felt, his hand instinctively reaching for his phone. No signal, of course. He’d known that coming in. It was a wonder Ellie’s texts had made it through.
The figure spoke—a low, guttural sound Mark did not understand. He could not make out a single word.
“I don’t understand,” Mark said, backing away from his equipment. “I’m not causing any harm here.”
The figure tilted its head, watching him. It didn’t say a word.
Finally, panic overtook Mark. He turned to run, but his boot caught on a rock, sending him sprawling. His palms slapped against the sandstone, skin tearing on the rough surface. The metallic scent of his own blood mingled with the desert dust as he attempted to scramble to his feet.
Too late. The figure moved with terrible speed, closing the distance between them in only a few heartbeats.
“Please,” Mark gasped as he turned on his back and gazed up at the shadowy figure. “I’ll leave now. I’ll never come back.”
The figure leaned closer, and although Mark could make out no discernible features in the shadows where its face must be, he sensed ancient malice emanating from it like heat from sunbaked stone. It spoke again, the words seeming to vibrate through Mark’s bones rather than reach his ears.
And then it attacked.