Kate Lander was the kind of person who traveled light—mentally and physically. But as she climbed into Eli Turner’s old Jeep that morning, her mind felt heavy with questions. The map they had found two days earlier lay folded neatly in her backpack, but it might as well have been carved into her thoughts. That symbol—an inverted triangle with three dots and a slash—was etched into her brain as vividly as if she’d dreamed it.
Eli, on the other hand, was silent behind the wheel. His fingers gripped the steering wheel like he was back in uniform, driving to some fire tower that needed inspection. The retired ranger in him was alert again. He hadn’t said much since she showed him the map, but Kate knew his wheels were turning.
“You think we’ll find anything?” she asked, breaking the silence.
Eli shrugged. “We’ll find trees, bugs, and maybe a patch of poison ivy. Beyond that? No promises.”
They drove south past the edges of Dover Hill, where the rolling fields gave way to hardwood forest. At a sharp bend, Eli pulled off the county road onto a rutted gravel path, one only locals or deer seemed to know.
“This is about as close as we can get by vehicle,” he said. “We’ll hike in from here.”
They walked in single file at first, following an overgrown trail that hadn’t seen a boot print in years. Kate ducked under a low-hanging oak branch and stopped when she spotted a rusted fence post.
“This area looks like it hasn’t been touched in decades,” she whispered.
Eli nodded. “Some of these woods haven’t changed much in a hundred years. That’s why I liked them.”
After an hour of careful bushwhacking, checking the map and compass every few yards, they reached a small rise where the forest floor gave way to a mossy clearing surrounded by large, weathered stones.
“This is it,” Eli said. “The topographic lines on the map match this ridge.”
Kate scanned the ground. “You feel that?”
Eli looked at her, puzzled. “Feel what?”
“I don’t know… like something’s off. Like we’re being watched.”
He crouched and brushed moss from the largest stone. There it was—faint, but visible. The same mark. An inverted triangle with a slash down the middle and three dots beneath it.
Kate let out a slow breath. “So it’s real.”
“Yeah,” Eli muttered. “But why now? Why here? And why add a mark that wasn’t on the first four ciphers?”
Before she could answer, the wind kicked up. A whisper, almost a word, rustled through the trees.
Then they heard it—a distant crack, like a branch breaking under weight.
Eli stood up, scanning the woods. “We’re not alone.”
Kate took a step back. “Maybe it’s just a deer.”
Eli didn’t move. “Let’s assume it isn’t.”
Suddenly, something fluttered down from the trees. A feather—white, but tipped in black—landed between them. Eli bent down to pick it up. As he did, he noticed something else etched faintly into the side of the stone, barely visible in the lichen. It wasn’t just a symbol.
It was a name.
Kate leaned in. “What does it say?”
Eli traced the letters. “E. Arvin.”
Kate’s eyes went wide. “As in Elias Arvin?”
Eli nodded slowly. “Maybe not just a map, Kate. Maybe this whole thing is a message… or a warning.”
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