Violet fire curled along my veins, pulsing in time with my heartbeat, alive and impatient. Every inhalation tasted of smoke and iron, the air thick with ash and something older—older than anything I had ever known. Silas moved beside me, a shadow and a blade all at once, eyes flicking to every ripple in the trees, every flicker in the underbrush. We weren’t just fighting—they were testing us, probing, waiting to see if I would break.

I felt it first, subtle, a tremor in the clearing, a ...