It was supposed to be a quiet day.
Hosea was off with Dutch and Arthur on a run out near Broken Ledge, checking on an old friend with a lead. Wyatt stayed behind at the homestead with Betsy, helping her patch the roof and fix the chicken wire.
"You ever think about building a real porch swing?" he asked as they sat outside, the late afternoon sun melting across the valley.
Betsy sipped her tea. "I'd need someone who knows how to measure straight."
Wyatt smirked. "You wound me."
"I barely touched you, boy."
Their laughter faded into the chirp of cicadas and the low rustle of wind through the dry grass. Peaceful. Almost too peaceful.
That's when he felt it.
Like a needle threading into his spine. A sudden wrongness.
He stood up, eyes scanning the tree line.
"Betsy, go inside."
She looked at him. "What—?"
"Now."
She didn't argue.
Wyatt drew his pistol. His hands weren't shaking.
They came from the trees — four men, maybe five. Rough-looking. Dirty boots. Greasy hats pulled low. No lawmen. These were worse.
One of them barked, "Where's Hosea?"
Wyatt didn't answer. Just fired.
The first shot hit the lead man in the shoulder, knocking him back. The others shouted, scattering toward cover. Bullets slammed into the wood of the porch as Wyatt ducked behind the railing.
"GET OUT HERE, OLD MAN!" one of them screamed. "WE KNOW YOUR IN THEIR"
Betsy's scream came from inside.
Wyatt fired again, clipped a man's leg, but he saw the flame before he smelled it.
They'd set the back of the house on fire.
Shit.
He kicked the door open. Smoke was already curling through the rafters.
"Betsy!" he shouted.
"I'm in the cellar!"
He rushed to the trapdoor and threw it open. "Stay down there! Don't come out unless it's quiet or I come back for you!"
"What about you?" she cried.
But he was already moving.
The fire ate the back wall. He could feel the heat tearing at his lungs. His eyes watered. The front door was blocked now. He crashed through a side window instead, landing hard in the dirt.
Two of them were still standing. One ran. The other raised his gun—
Wyatt's revolver cracked.
The man folded.
Then the fire roared louder behind him. The entire house now lit like a funeral pyre.
"Betsy!" he shouted again, turning back—but the world tilted.
Pain. Deep and sudden. A bullet. He hit the ground, ears ringing, hands slipping.
Smoke. Flames. Shouting. A second shot. Darkness.
And then—
Stillness.
He wasn't dead.
Or if he was, it didn't feel like death.
He floated in a place that had no sky, no floor. Just endless, shifting light and the sound of whispers he couldn't understand. A soft hum vibrated through his bones.
Then a voice.
Not loud. Not cruel. Just there.
"The thread breaks early, boy. But you are not done."
Wyatt opened his mouth, but no sound came.
"The fire took the shell, not the spark. A gift, for a reason that is not yours to know. Not yet."
Then light — blinding, impossible — burst through the darkness.
And in his hand, something cold.
A coin.
Worn, blackened, and impossibly heavy despite its size. Etched with a strange, shifting symbol he couldn't read. It pulsed faintly, like a second heartbeat.
Then, the world came back.
He woke in ashes.
Ashes and ruin.
The house was gone. Burned to the earth. Only smoldering wood and scorched stone remained. He sat up slowly, confused by the weight in his bones. The wound on his side — gone. Yet the scars remained almost mockingly as a reminder of what happened and what he lost.
The coin still sat in his palm.
He clutched it, eyes wide, and stumbled through the wreckage.
"Betsy?" he called, coughing. "Betsy!"
But there was no answer.
The cellar had caved in.
He clawed through the debris until his fingers bled. But the earth wouldn't give her back.
She was gone.
Gone because of him.
He collapsed to his knees.
Not from pain.
From rage.
And guilt.
They buried a body.
They didn't find his, but Hosea knew the house had burned, and Wyatt was gone.
Arthur said nothing for a long time. Just stared at the ashes.
Dutch called it a tragedy. Swore vengeance. But his eyes were already elsewhere.
Hosea didn't speak for two days.
He just sat on the hill, staring at the smoke where his home used to be.
Wyatt watched them. From the trees. Alive.
He didn't understand how. Not yet.
But he knew this: he was gonna make the people who did this pay.