The wardline cracked like ice.
Quinn barely had time to react before the energy tore through the den—hot, metallic, wrong. His ears rang, senses flooded by the reek of burnt ozone and blood-echo.
He lunged toward Rowan’s room, but Jace was faster.
“Stay back!” Jace growled, throwing his arm in front of Quinn, even as his own body trembled.
Inside the room, Rowan didn’t look like their son anymore.
He was Rowan—but something layered behind his features, draped over his limbs like a second skin made of shadow and instinct. His silver eyes were burning from the inside out. Hair lifted as if touched by a phantom wind. The mark on his chest—Quinn’s birthmark, Jace’s bloodline—glowed like molten silver.
And hovering behind him.
A figure.
Not fully formed. Not yet.
It rose from Rowan’s s
