Jonas’s POV
The trail changed before we even saw the place.
It wasn’t gradual. Not a simple intensification of Callie’s presence in the air, but a clean break—abrupt, unmistakable—as if something had altered the very structure of the environment, leaving behind a mark that didn’t belong to any known pattern. It wasn’t just the passage of something powerful.
It was the exact moment that something had stopped being what it used to be.
I slowed without needing to tell Asher. He felt it at the same time—as always—and in that instant, we stopped moving like hunters and became something more cautious, more attentive.
Because this was no longer a pursuit.
Not even a search.
It was something else.
“You feel it?” Asher asked quietly, though it was unnecessary.
“Yes,” I replied, stopping at
