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I am reborn in ashes.

The rocks scrape my palms and knees as I haul myself from the scorched earth, spitting grit from my parched lips. Bloody hell, everything hurts.

My limbs tremble, muscles spasming as if they’ve forgotten their purpose. I squint against the gritty smoke stinging my eyes, taking in the unfamiliar landscape through watery vision.

Where the devil am I? How did I get here?

And who do I have to murder for burying me?

Panic slices through me. I’m in a devastated forest, the skeletal trunks twisting amidst the drifting embers. Nothing stirs save for the lazy swirl of ash caught on a fitful breeze. It’s a graveyard. Lifeless. Barren.

Except for me.

My fingers claw into the soil, desperately seeking purchase on something—anything—familiar. But there’s no clues to indicate how I came to be dumped in this godforsaken place.

Marvellous. Just how I wanted to start my morning—naked and reeking of smoke and death.

Think. How did you get here?

I search my mind for even the barest memory, but it’s an empty vault echoing with shadows. Someone has come along and scooped everything out, leaving nothing but a gaping void where my past should reside—terrifying in its absoluteness. There should be something here. A lifetime of memories.

Panic tightens its hold, crushing the breath from my lungs. I force it down through gritted teeth.

Just breathe , I tell myself. Take stock. See what you’ve got to work with.

Ten fingers, ten toes, all attached where they should be. A small victory, I suppose, though waking up with all limbs intact seems like the absolute bare minimum for a normal existence. Since when did not being dismembered become the standard?

Think. Use your instincts. Focus.

I reach into my mind again for anything familiar and feel . . . power. Unfamiliar and volatile, pressing at my breastbone with the urgency of a caged beast. Before I can stop myself—before I realise what I’m doing—it surges through my veins, scalding. Dangerous.

I don’t know how to control it.

Fear knots in my belly as my control snaps . Power bursts out of me with a concussive force and a jarring crack echoes across the landscape. A blast of dirt hits my face. My eyes fly open—and horror spears through me.

All the trees have splintered and collapsed, crashing to the earth in a dizzying rain of cinders and char. Clouds of ash swirl upward, freed from the decimated remnants of the forest. Each mote glimmers and dies like a fading star, winking into nothingness.

Pull it in. Leash it. Cage it. You can’t let that happen again.

The volatile power settles back into my chest, a solid weight that leaves me doubled over with a pained gasp.

As if it’s stretching the very bones and sinews of my body, forcing itself into a space never meant to contain it.

I can feel it searching for weaknesses, any cracks or fissures. Looking for an escape.

This magic doesn’t belong to me.

A low, ancient voice whispers through my mind then.

I came to make you an offer.

More disjointed flashes—the brush of brittle fingers against mine. A skeletal embrace. Then pain, searing and excruciating—

I force the unhelpful, fragmented images down into the dark well of memory.

You need to focus if you’re going to get out of here.

The problem is, I’ve no idea where here is. The panic bubbles up again inside my chest, a fist intent on crushing the breath from my lungs.

Stay calm , I order myself. I try to latch onto some basic fact, anything to clear the desperation. Start small. What’s my name?

Surely I remember my own damned name.

But the answer eludes me, dancing just out of reach. I grasp at emptiness where my identity should be.

Fear slices into my chest. What sort of person doesn’t know their own name?

It feels like it should come easily—the shape of it in my mouth, the cadence, the letters forming a familiar pattern.

But when I push against the dark corners of my mind, the answer dances just out of reach.

I’ve never known panic so visceral that it threatens to choke me. I pick up my pace through the scorched skeletons of the once proud forest, heedless of the debris tearing at the tender soles of my feet. I need to find answers before the lack of them shatters the last scrap of my sanity.

Up ahead, a sliver of sunlight cuts through the oppressive clouds. It glints off the smooth surface of a loch nestled between the charred hills.

Maybe if I see my reflection, it will trigger something. A name. My face. Anything to prove I exist outside of this harrowing blank canvas.

I break into a desperate sprint, tearing through the blackened trees.

Twigs slash at my feet, but I ignore each bright spark of pain.

I burst from the tree line and race down the rocky beach, making straight for what appears to be the skeletal remains of a dock.

The weathered planks seem just sturdy enough to bear my weight.

My feet strike the cracked boards, and the entire structure gives an ominous groan in protest. When I finally reach the dock’s end, I sink onto my stomach and peer down at my wavering reflection in the still water.

Not mine.

The face staring back makes my breath snag painfully in my chest. Because those eyes—those aren’t mine.

I know with absolute certainty they should be a different colour.

A warm, earthy hazel flecked through with strands of emerald and umber.

These irises gleam like molten gold, radiant amber ringed in fathomless black. Strange and lovely and unsettling.

I examine the rest of my features, searching for some flaw proving this is all an illusion conjured by my shattered mind.

But the face peering up at me through the gentle ripples is familiar.

A light constellation of freckles scattered across sharp cheekbones.

Flame-coloured hair curling in wild disarray around a delicate jaw.

Full lips and arched brows set over those eerie, luminous eyes.

I keep returning to them, unable to focus on anything but that unearthly glow. I see something shift under the surface, a ripple of shadow beneath the amber.

Before I can think better of it, I’m reaching for the reflection of this stranger wearing my skin. The moment I make contact, liquid agony lances through me—a white-hot pike spearing every nerve.

Frost blooms under my fingertips, sending ice crystals extending like fractals across the loch. I watch in horrified fascination as the frigid tendrils multiply, elaborate whorls and spikes of frozen lace blooming in their wake.

I try desperately to draw the power back, but it bucks and strains against my hold, testing the limits of my control. And I’m not strong enough to contain its fury. The ice spreads unchecked toward the craggy rocks lining the distant beach. I’m helpless to halt its relentless advance.

“Slow down,” I choke out. My pleading whisper goes unheeded. This is chaos given form—untamed and brutal.

“Stop! Please, just stop.”

The magic thrashes like a wounded beast.

I somehow wrestle the volatile power back to that cramped space between my ribs. My body bows against the pain, containing something so lethal and powerful within such a fragile shell. Now, the loch and shore lie locked under a smooth sheet of ice.

What did I just do?

Another fragmented memory rises—a withered hand crushing mine, cracked lips whispering against my ear. Then agony, as that ruthless magic is forced into my veins. My screams echo.

I stagger under the weight of the image, barely catching myself against a nearby boulder before my legs buckle.

Gasping, I turn from the glittering expanse of the loch and stumble up the rocky beach on quivering limbs, urgency lending me speed.

I need to control the volatile power still shivering through my body before I hurt someone.

Kill someone.

What am I? The thought whispers through my mind, taking sinister root.

Fae.

No. I reject the insidious notion outright. I’m not one of them. I stare at my hands, cataloguing the small cuts stippling my skin. The sting offers some hollow reassurance—mortals bleed so easily. It’s in our nature.

I’m still human.

But everything about my existence feels wrong.

Unnatural. The steady rhythm of approaching hooves pulls me from my troubled musings.

Three pairs, drawing nearer across the rocky terrain.

The synchronised impact resonates through the soles of my feet, vibrating up my legs and buzzing along my nerves.

Power precedes the riders, rich and heady in the air. It teases my senses, speaking to something primal coiled deep inside me. Something that stirs and unfurls in response, attuned to the song of ancient magic woven into the fabric of this world.

My gaze drops again to the icy loch, then to my hands, red and swollen. I’m aware of three things, with chilling certainty:

I possess lethal power that’s not my own.

Fae are riding to find me.

And I have no memory of who I am.