Chapter One: The Things I Wasn’t Supposed to See

People think the world makes sense if you look at it long enough.

Like if you study hard enough, listen carefully enough, follow the rules closely enough—everything will line up the way it’s supposed to.

That’s a lie.

The world doesn’t warn you before it breaks.

My name is Pierce Wood.

I was fourteen years old when I learned that some stories don’t belong to the people who live them.

And that some memories aren’t yours—until they are.

I was sitting on my bed when it started.

Not studying. Not sleeping. Just sitting there, legs pulled up, staring at the cracked photograph I kept tucked inside my desk drawer. I’d told myself I’d throw it away a hundred times.

I never did.

The picture was old, edges bent, the glass split straight down the middle like someone had tried to tear him in half. My father stared back at me with the same dark hair I saw every morning in the mirror. Same eyes, too—sharp blue, like the sky right before a storm.

People told me I got everything from my mom.

They were wrong.

He’d left when I was little. Or died. No one ever gave me a straight answer. Just quiet voices and changed subjects and that look adults get when they think you’re too young to handle the truth.

I pressed my thumb against the crack in the glass.

And then I heard screaming.

Not outside.

Not down the street.

Inside my head.

I flinched, jerking upright, heart slamming against my ribs. The sound was raw—panicked, desperate, loud enough that my ears rang like they’d been struck.

“What—?” I whispered, but my voice was swallowed whole.

The room blurred.

White light flashed behind my eyes, too bright, too sudden. My chest tightened as if something heavy had settled there, pressing down, stealing air from my lungs.

The screaming got worse.

It wasn’t just sound anymore.

It was fear.

Not mine.

I tasted metal. My hands shook so badly the photo slipped from my fingers and hit the floor. Blood dripped from my ears, warm and wet, splashing against my shirt.

I clutched my head, nails digging into my scalp. “Stop,” I choked, though I didn’t know who I was talking to. “Please—stop—”

Images slammed into me.

Ice.
Fire.

Something massive moving through the air.

Pain so sharp it felt like it split straight through my skull.

I screamed.

The door burst open.

“Pierce?” My mom’s voice cut through the chaos. “Pierce, what’s wrong?”
I saw her standing in the doorway, panic written across her face, mouth forming my name again.

I tried to answer.
I never got the chance.

The world tilted, folded in on itself—and went dark.