[Emma's POV]
The forest beyond the Blackwood estate wasn't just dark; it was wrong. It had been sculpted by a malignant will. The air hung thick and resistant, tasting of burnt copper and rotting moss. Ancient oaks, once proud sentinels, now twisted in agonized postures, their branches forming archways that felt less like wood and more like petrified bone.
Jaxon and Cain moved through this corrupted landscape like ghosts, their senses stretched to breaking, tracking the fading, rage-scented trail of Maddox and the cold, slick residue of Damon’s sorcery. Every shadow felt watchful, every rustle a potential ambush. But the compulsion to retrieve their brother, to shatter this blatant trap, was an unbreakable tether of its own.
I was the unstable element between them, a live wire of agony
