Lorali Roseburn's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Lorali pushed through the woodshed door behind the bakery, flour still dusting her sleeves. Three months of searching, and she'd finally found what her grandmother had hidden. The space looked ordinary enough—stacked firewood, rusted tools, dust thick as frosting. But Grandmother never kept ordinary spaces. She knelt beside the loose floorboard in the corner, the one that didn't match the others. Beneath it, brass gears glinted in the shadows. A hidden room lay below, all copper pipes and steam valves her grandmother had installed in secret. Ledgers lined the wall in neat rows—not recipes, but names. Client lists. Jobs completed. The Ruby Chest had to be down here somewhere. Movement flickered in her peripheral vision. A shadow crossed the window, too deliberate to be wind. Someone was watching. Lorali kept her face calm, her movements steady as she memorized the ledger positions. She'd return tonight. Paper trails were for amateurs and dead folk, Grandmother always said, but whoever killed her had left Lorali one anyway. She climbed the ladder back up, scanning the woodshed for anything she'd missed. That's when she saw it—a matchbox wedged behind a tool rack, fresh despite the dust everywhere else. The brass gears and ornate lettering caught the light. Gunpowder Gals. She pocketed it without touching the striker. Outside, fifty yards into the desert, a skull mounted on vertebrae rose from the sand like a warning. The bone had been bleached white by sun and time. Her grandmother's marker. Whoever was watching knew exactly what this place meant, and they wanted Lorali to know they'd been here first. Lorali locked the woodshed and walked back toward the bakery. Her steps stayed even, unhurried. Let them watch. They'd shown their hand by leaving the matchbox, proved they didn't know where the Ruby Chest was either. Otherwise, they wouldn't still be lurking around her grandmother's markers. She had the ledgers now, names to cross-reference with the jobs Grandmother never spoke about. The watcher's mistake changed everything. This wasn't just about finding the chest anymore—it was a race.