Lucian woke to the sound of wind rustling through tall grass.
The air was warm. Probably summer air, not the stale, dusty chill of the ruined manor. For a long, dizzy moment, he lay still, blinking against sunlight that was far too bright to be coming through a burned-out window. The sky above him was the kind of blue he'd only seen in filtered photographs, sharp and soft all at once. He sat up slowly, his palm sinking into dry earth.
He was outside.
The cabin was gone.
He turned in a slow circle, his head pounding. The field stretched on in waves of gold and green, bordered by a gravel road that led toward a line of trees. And beyond them, the Lowell manor. But not the blackened skeleton of a manor he'd known. This one stood whole, white walls gleaming, windows glittering under the sun. Even the veranda railings, long since collapsed, were intact. Flowers spilled over the hedges in unruly color.
For a second, he couldn't breathe.
The old family house hadn't looked like that in forty years.
He pressed a hand to his head, willing the throbbing to stop. Maybe the lantern's fumes had gotten to him. Maybe he'd passed out. Maybe he was dreaming. He pulled his phone from his pocket, but the screen glowed only for a moment before flashing "no signal."
A car passed on the road, rumbling loud and close. It was old, boxy, chrome edges glinting, and painted a faded teal. Inside, two people sat talking, their hairstyles and clothes straight out of a retro film. The woman wore bright lipstick, the man had an oversized denim jacket. Lucian watched them disappear down the road, the world tilting a little more with every second.
"This isn't real," he whispered.
The sun burned high above him. He could smell wildflowers, exhaust, the distant trace of something fried from a nearby diner. All of it too real, too solid.
He started toward the manor, his shoes crunching over gravel. The closer he got, the louder the cicadas became. He was halfway up the drive when someone grabbed his arm from behind and yanked him sharply back.
"What the—!"
A hand steadied him before he could fall. A voice, sharp and low, said, "Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you?"
Lucian turned, startled, and found himself face to face with a boy—or no, a young man, maybe a year older than him, eighteen years old probably. The stranger was handsome in that jarring, cinematic way: tall, hair a shade too dark to be brown, a narrow scar just below his lip that looked almost deliberate. His clothes were old-fashioned but clean—rolled-up sleeves, suspenders hanging loose at his sides, a faint smear of soot near his collarbone.
He was frowning, though his eyes held a glint of relief. "You can't just disappear like that, Lance. Ellis nearly tore the woods apart looking for you."
Lucian stared blankly.
The man kept going, words tumbling fast: "Do you have any idea how furious your father is? If I hadn't covered for you—God, he'd have the whole household grounded again. And Ellis—" He stopped, squinting at Lucian's expression. "Hey. Are you even listening?"
The sound of his voice blurred around the edges. Lucian's heartbeat drowned everything out. The world was too bright, his head too light, and all he could think about was that name.
Lance.
He heard it again, clear this time, firm with habit. "Honestly, Master Lance, if you keep pulling stunts like this, I might just stop helping you."
Lucian froze. The world seemed to stutter.
"What did you just call me?" His voice came out thin and cracked.
The man blinked, taken aback. "What—Master Lance? That's your name, isn't it?"
"Don't—" Lucian stepped back, shaking his head. "Don't call me that. Don't you dare call me that. He's dead!"
The man stared at him as if he'd started speaking another language. "Dead? What are you talking about?"
"I—" Lucian's throat tightened. He looked around wildly. The trees, the manor, the sunlight—it was all real. Too real. There was no ruin, no ash, no decades of decay. Just the smell of cut grass and blooming roses. He could hear the faint hum of electricity from the manor's open windows.
He took a shaky breath. "This isn't…this can't be—"
"Lance," the man interrupted, voice gentler now. "You're scaring me. Did you hit your head?"
"I'm not—" Lucian started, then stopped. The words caught. He didn't know how to explain it, and how to even form the thought that maybe he wasn't supposed to be here at all.
He looked down at his hands, trembling. "What day is it?"
The man hesitated. "What?"
"Just—tell me. What's today's date?"
The man frowned but humored him. "July first. Nineteen eighty-five."
The world dropped out beneath him.
He stared past the man toward the manor. The unburned walls, the glass windows flashing with sunlight. July, 1985. A month before the fire.
His uncle's face in the photograph flashed behind his eyes.
The man touched his shoulder carefully. "You're acting strange today, Lance. Did something happen? You look at me like you've never seen me before."
Lucian forced his gaze up. The man's eyes were a deep, steady brown, almost gold where the light hit them. He looked… familiar, but not in a way Lucian could place.
"Who are you?" Lucian asked quietly.
The man blinked again, startled into a laugh. "What kind of question is that?"
"Just answer."
He looked at him for a moment longer, concern etched between his brows. Then, finally, he said, "It's Rohan Wynn, Lance."
The name hung in the air like a spark.
Lucian didn't recognize it. But something about it felt heavy, as though it carried the echo of a story not yet told. He swallowed hard, whispering the syllables under his breath.
"Rohan… Wynn."
Rohan tilted his head. "You really did hit your head, didn't you?"
Lucian didn't answer. His eyes had drifted past him, toward the manor in the distance—the white walls gleaming so bright they almost hurt to look at.
And all he could think, in that dizzy quiet, was that he was standing in the middle of a month that should not exist.