The world stilled.
For one heartbeat, there was silence—deep, suffocating, endless.
Then the earth screamed.
The second rift widened beneath Rowan’s body, veins of darkness spreading across the ground like cracks in glass. The once-flickering Veil was now a vortex—swirling shadows, ancient whispers, fragments of old languages no one remembered how to fear… until now.
Quinn held Rowan close, but he could feel it. This wasn’t just Kaelen’s presence slipping—this was something else. Something waking up.
“Rowan,” Quinn choked, brushing hair from his son's damp forehead. “Come back to me.”
Rowan's body arched violently, his mouth falling open as a guttural sound tore free—not a scream, but a growl so deep it rattled bones.
And then...
He laughed.
But it wasn’t Rowan’s laugh. It was anc
