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Moonlight painted the world in shades of silver and shadow as Jenna stood, her feet rooted to the grassy earth, before the solitary gravestone of Marie Bates. A chill brushed her skin, yet she felt an odd comfort in the familiarity of the scene at the Bates family property: the iron fence guarding the plot, the way the night seemed to hold its breath around her. She blinked, attempting to piece together how she had come to stand here at this gravesite.

“I’m sorry, Marie,” Jenna murmured, her voice barely above a whisper. “I should’ve brought flowers.” It seemed the right thing to do, to offer respect to the dead.

As the apology left her lips, a cry shattered the stillness—a raw, ragged sound that shook the tranquil scene. Jenna’s head snapped up, instinctively reaching for the gun that wasn’t there at her hip. The cry echoed again, a desperate plea that pulled at her very soul.

She turned and saw Roger Bates, a rancher she’d known since her childhood. His familiar weathered face bore the harsh lines of a lifetime on the ranch, now twisted into a mask of raw terror. Jenna suddenly became lucid; she knew she was dreaming. And if Roger Bates was here in her dream, it could only mean one thing—that he was dead. And it was up to her to decode whatever riddling message he was trying to give her.

“Roger, tell me what happened,” she demanded. But as Roger opened his mouth to respond, his words were swallowed by a voice so deep and resonant that it seemed to rise from the earth itself, vibrating through the air with the force of ancient authority.

“The land remembers,” the voice boomed, turning Jenna’s blood to ice. The words were cold and menacing, like a sudden winter chill.

She blinked, trying to rationalize the auditory hallucination. Dreams were her domain, yet this felt alien, a message meant for more than just her subconscious to decipher.

Before she could question him further, Roger rushed past her, propelled by a terror Jenna had seen only in the eyes of those who’d stared death in the face. He sprinted towards the solitary headstone of his late wife, Marie, and clung to it as though it were a lifeline cast across the chasm between life and death.

“Roger!” Jenna called again, moving closer, the investigator within her desperate for answers. “What does it mean? Why is this happening?”

But Roger seemed beyond reach, his gaze fixated on the marble marker, hands digging into the earth as if trying to anchor himself against a tide that sought to sweep him away.

Jenna’s breath caught in her throat as the voice thundered once more.

“You are too small for the land. You are too small for the sky. The sky is too big for you.”

Lifting her eyes, Jenna felt her consciousness dwarfed by the immensity of the cosmos. The stars above Trentville were usually bright here outside of town, but here in this dream-scape, they blazed with a ferocity that was both beautiful and terrifying. Each one throbbed with a pulsating light, like the heartbeat of the universe itself.

The vastness overwhelmed her, taunting her with its indifference to human struggles. She realized the insignificance of her own existence against such infinity; she was but a speck on the canvas of time, grappling with earthly sorrows while the skies stretched boundlessly, untouched by mortal pain.

As if responding to her introspection, the boundary between earth and sky began to dissolve. A hiss, like the release of pent-up steam from the bowels of the earth, filled the air. Then a brand ignited with a flame so intense it seemed not of this world. The tree-shaped symbol, horrifically familiar, emblazoned the night with its fiery presence, filling up the cavernous sky. It matched the mark found seared into Clyde Simmons’s flesh.

“The land remembers,” the voice boomed again.

Then Jenna was ripped from the dream, or rather nightmare, with such suddenness that the room seemed to sway before her eyes. An abrupt ringing shattered the stillness of her bedroom. Disoriented, she reached out with a trembling hand and snatched her phone from the nightstand, the glow of the screen stark against the scant light filtering through her bedroom curtains. The caller ID read “Colonel Spelling” in unapologetic boldness, an omen that set her nerves on edge. Jenna sat up, pressing the phone hard against her ear as if to squeeze reality back into her senses.

“Graves,” she answered, her voice croaking with sleep and residual terror. There was a pause on the line, the kind that stretched for just a moment too long, filled with the crackle of static and the weight of impending revelation.

“Sheriff Graves,” came Spelling’s voice. “We’ve got another one.”

Jenna’s thoughts spun, colliding with the images from her dream so vividly that for a moment she couldn’t distinguish between the two realities. Fragments of her dream—the brand in the sky, the ominous voice—clashed with the urgency of the call. Roger Bates’s name hovered on the tip of her tongue, but she bit the words back.

“Who is it?” she asked, her voice steadier now.

Jenna’s fingertips went numb as Colonel Spelling confirmed the victim’s identity. “Roger Bates,” he confirmed, his voice a low rumble. “His body was found at his ranch. It’s the same MO, all right. The same killer.”

“Understood, Colonel. My deputy and I will be there as soon as we can.” Her voice was steady, betraying none of the turmoil she felt.

“Make it quick, Graves. This one’s... it’s as bad as the other,” Spelling added. “We’ll need you here as soon as possible.” And with that, he clicked off, leaving Jenna alone with the silence and her galloping thoughts.

She sat motionless for a moment. The dream—so vivid and haunting with its cryptic warnings—seemed to bleed into reality. She would soon see Roger Bates again, not as a specter in her subconscious, but as a victim sprawled against a tombstone, branded by a legacy of violence.

The second part of the message from her dream tugged at her awareness: “The sky is too big for you.” What was it trying to convey? A warning? A limitation?

She called her deputy. “Jake, it’s Jenna,” she said. “There’s been another murder. Roger Bates. We need to get to his ranch right away. I’m coming to get you.”

“Understood,” came Jake’s immediate response, his tone grim.

Jenna set the phone aside and swung her legs off the bed. She paused, her feet touching the cool wooden floor, feeling the remnants of the dream cling to her. She stood abruptly, her movements mechanical as she shed the cotton t-shirt and shorts she slept in, replacing them with the crisp uniform that signified her role as Genesius County’s guardian. With each button fastened on her shirt, she willed herself to compartmentalize—to lock away the haunting dream that clung to her like a stubborn fog.

She glanced in the mirror, noting the pallor of her skin and the way her green eyes seemed dulled from the night’s phantasmagoria. The face staring back at her was the sheriff of Genesius County—resolved, relentless—but beneath the surface, Jenna wrestled with spectral warnings and premonitions. She ran a comb through her short hair, a physical attempt to rid herself of images that threatened to spill from her dream realm.

In the predawn dimness of her kitchen, she moved to the refrigerator and took out a carton of orange juice, her hands automatically pouring a glass. She drank deeply, the cold liquid a striking contrast to the lingering heat of her nightmare. She grabbed a granola bar, chewing methodically, the mundane act a grounding ritual amidst the chaos of her thoughts. Protein, carbs—fuel for the body, fortifications for the mind. That’s what survival looked like: one foot in front of the other, one bite after another.

As she swallowed the last mouthful of the bar, Jenna checked her duty belt, ensuring her service weapon, radio, and handcuffs were all secure before slipping into her patrol boots. She grabbed her keys and stepped outside, locking the door behind her. The coolness of the early morning air was welcome against her skin. She climbed into her patrol car and started the engine, allowing the thrum of the motor to fill her senses, a tangible reminder of the physical world. In her rearview mirror, the light of dawn crept across the horizon.

“Focus,” she whispered to herself, backing out of the driveway. As she navigated the quiet streets of Trentville, a silent resolve settled over her. Today would be a reckoning of sorts, a test of her ability to balance the seen with the unseen, the known with the unknowable.

The drive to Jake’s house was quiet, the world around her still held in the soft grasp of the pre-dawn hours. Even so, she felt as though she could still hear the echoes of the angry voices at last night’s meeting. And now the town had something new to fuel its outrage.

As Jake slid into the passenger seat of her patrol car, he gave her a reassuring nod.

“Spelling said this one is bad,” she told him.

Jake’s expression tightened with concern, but before he could respond, Jenna continued, her voice low, “I had another one of those dreams.”

“About the case?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“More than that,” Jenna said, her grip on the steering wheel betraying the tension she felt. “Roger Bates appeared, crying out in fear... and then there was this other voice.”

Jake leaned forward slightly, urging her to continue.

“It said, ‘The land remembers.’ And then, ‘The sky is too big for you.’” She relayed the words with a trace of awe, unsure of what they signified but certain of their importance. “It felt like a warning—maybe also a clue.”

“Those are some cryptic messages,” Jake admitted. “And the sky being too big... what do you make of that?”

“I wish I knew,” Jenna replied, her eyes fixed on the road ahead, even as her mind still grappled with the spectral images from her dream.

“Any theories?” Jake’s voice cut through her reverie, his eyes searching hers for fragments of insight that might piece together the enigmatic warning from her dream.

Jenna shook her head, her focus sharpening on the scene before them. “Not yet,” she admitted. “You know how my dreams work. The dead don’t always understand the messages they try to send me. And even if they do, they speak in riddles. But there’s a connection here we can’t ignore. We just have to find it.”

Their conversation dwindled as they neared Bates’s ranch, both lost in thought. Jenna’s mind circled the voice’s haunting message, while Jake pondered silently beside her, the trust and unspoken bond between them tangible.

The horizon bled with the blush of dawn as Jenna pulled the patrol car into a gravelly stop beside the Bates farmhouse. The property, usually a scene of pastoral stillness, was now a hive of urgent activity. State Police cruisers were scattered around, their red and blue lights casting an otherworldly glow against the awakening sky, while the coroner’s van sat ominously apart, its back doors ajar like a silent invitation to the grim discoveries.

Stepping out of the car, Jenna felt the gravel crunch beneath her boots, the sound oddly grounding amid the noise of radio chatter and shuffling feet. She straightened her sheriff’s jacket, steeling herself for what awaited as Jake joined her side.

They had barely taken a few strides towards the farmhouse when Colonel Spelling came striding toward them. His uniform was impeccable, but the lines etched around his eyes betrayed the gravity of the situation.

“Graves, Hawkins,” he greeted them curtly, his nod stiff and professional. Without preamble, he turned on his heel, beckoning them to follow. Jenna and Jake exchanged a brief glance before falling into step behind Spelling, their anticipation mounting.

Spelling led them past the farmhouse, where officers and forensic technicians moved with a well-rehearsed choreography, and towards the small, fenced burial plot that held a solitary tombstone—the same marker that had appeared in Jenna’s dream. The iron gate, normally secured, hung open like a broken jaw, its usual role abandoned.

As they crossed the threshold, Jenna’s breath caught at the sight that met her gaze. Roger Bates lay prostrate against Marie’s headstone, his body unnaturally still. The pre-dawn light cast across his features accentuated the stark terror frozen on his face. And there, seared onto his chest, was the brand – the same eerie tree-shaped symbol that had haunted her dream.