Updated Nov 20, 2025 • ~6 min read
Liana had always hated prophecies.
They were the kind of thing desperate people clung to when reality wasn’t enough—vague promises wrapped in pretty words, designed to make you believe your suffering meant something. She’d seen it a hundred times in her twenty-four years: someone’s grandmother interpreting tea leaves, a street mystic reading palms for coin, the Council elders droning on about “signs” and “celestial alignments.”
All of it, every last word, was garbage.
So when her best friend Maya dragged her to the rooftop garden to watch the Perseids, Liana went only because she’d already bailed on the last three outings. Not because she believed a meteor shower held any significance beyond burning space rocks hitting atmosphere.
“This is supposed to be the best show in decades,” Maya said, spreading a blanket across the rooftop’s weathered tiles. The city sprawled below them, lights glittering like landlocked stars. “The news said—”
“The news says a lot of things.” Liana dropped onto the blanket, pulling her knees to her chest. The August air was thick and warm, carrying the scent of night-blooming jasmine from the garden boxes Maya had insisted on installing. “Doesn’t make them true.”
Maya shot her a look, dark eyes reproachful in the dim light. “You know, most people find wonder in the universe. You don’t have to be so…”
“Realistic?”
“Cynical.”
Liana shrugged. She’d earned her cynicism the hard way—through a childhood spent watching her mother chase every prophecy, every sign, every hint that Liana’s absent father might return. Spoiler alert: he never did. The prophecies had all been wrong, or vague enough to twist into whatever shape grief needed them to be.
“Just watch,” Maya said, lying back on the blanket. “No commentary required.”
Fine. Liana could do that. She stretched out beside Maya, tilting her head back to take in the sky. Even with the city’s light pollution, the stars were visible tonight—sharp pinpricks against the velvet dark. The moon was a sliver, barely there, which meant the meteors would shine brighter when they came.
If they came.
Minutes passed in comfortable silence. Liana’s mind wandered to work—the gallery opening next week, the new artist who couldn’t decide on a hanging order, the budget spreadsheet she’d promised to finish by Monday. Normal things. Real things.
Then the sky began to bleed light.
The first meteor streaked overhead, a brilliant white slash that left afterimages dancing in Liana’s vision. Maya gasped. Then another came, and another, until the sky was full of falling stars—dozens of them, hundreds maybe, all burning their way through the atmosphere in glorious, silent destruction.
It was… beautiful. Liana hated admitting it, but there it was. Beautiful in a way that made her chest ache.
“Make a wish,” Maya whispered.
“That’s not how meteors work.”
“Humor me.”
Liana closed her eyes, just for a second. Fine. A wish. She wished for… what? Stability? She had that. Success? She was working on it. Love?
Her eyes snapped open. Absolutely not. She wasn’t her mother. She didn’t need—
The world went white.
Not the sky. The world. Everything. A flash of light so bright and so sudden that Liana’s vision whited out completely. She felt herself jerk upright, felt her hands fly to her eyes, but there was nothing to see, nothing but that blazing, impossible white.
Heat seared across her left shoulder blade, sharp and burning like someone had pressed a brand to her skin. She heard herself cry out—or maybe that was Maya—and then the light was gone.
Liana blinked rapidly, spots dancing in her vision. Her shoulder throbbed. Beside her, Maya was sitting up too, looking around wildly.
“What the hell was that?” Maya’s voice was shaky. “Did you see—”
“Yeah.” Liana’s own voice sounded distant, muffled. Her ears were ringing. She reached back, pressing her palm to her shoulder blade, and winced. The skin was hot through her thin tank top, radiating heat like she’d spent too long in the sun. “Did something hit me?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so?” Maya scrambled closer, her hands hovering uncertainly. “Let me see.”
Liana twisted, trying to pull her tank top aside enough to check, but the angle was wrong. Maya helped, tugging the fabric down, and then went very still.
“What?” Liana demanded. “What is it?”
“There’s…” Maya’s voice had gone quiet. Careful. “There’s a mark.”
“What kind of mark?”
“I don’t know. It’s… glowing.”
Liana’s stomach dropped. “That’s not funny.”
“I’m not joking.” Maya’s fingers ghosted over Liana’s skin, not quite touching. “It looks like… I don’t know, like a constellation? Or a burn? Liana, I think you should go to the hospital.”
“It’s probably just a heat flash. Or some kind of atmospheric thing.” Liana was already pulling her phone out, opening the camera app, switching it to front-facing. She angled it over her shoulder and nearly dropped it.
The mark was there. Unmistakable. A pattern of interconnected lines, delicate as lace, glowing with a faint silver-blue light against her brown skin. It looked like someone had drawn stars across her shoulder blade and connected them with threads of light.
It looked like a constellation.
“Oh my god,” Maya breathed. “Liana, that’s—”
“Don’t.” Liana’s voice came out sharper than she intended. “Don’t say it.”
“But the prophecies—”
“There are no prophecies.” Liana shoved her phone back in her pocket, yanking her tank top back into place. The mark still burned, a constant ache that was quickly becoming impossible to ignore. “This is some kind of… radiation burn, or a weird reaction to the meteor shower. There’s a scientific explanation.”
There had to be.
Because the alternative—that this was real, that the old stories were true, that the starmarks were more than myths—was impossible. The starmarks were legends. Fairy tales about people chosen by the cosmos, bound to their fated mates by light written in their skin.
And Liana didn’t believe in fate.
Her phone buzzed. Once. Twice. Three times in rapid succession. She pulled it out, frowning. The screen was filled with notifications—news alerts, all of them, all saying basically the same thing:
BREAKING: Unprecedented meteor activity reported worldwide
Thousands witness mysterious light phenomenon during Perseid shower
Social media flooded with images of “starmarks”—mass hysteria or cosmic event?
Liana’s hands were shaking. She forced herself to breathe slowly, evenly. This was fine. This was explainable. Lots of people were probably experiencing the same thing. It didn’t mean anything.
It didn’t.
“Liana.” Maya’s hand found hers, squeezing gently. “Whatever this is, we’ll figure it out. Okay?”
Liana nodded, not trusting her voice. On her shoulder, the mark pulsed once, a wave of heat and light that rolled through her entire body.
And somewhere across the city—across the world, maybe—Liana could have sworn she felt an answering pulse. Like a heartbeat that wasn’t hers.
Like someone else was burning too.
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