Ten years laterThe morning sun filtered through a silver-glass windowpane into the great hall of the estate.The air held the scent of jasmine and old magic—comforting, ancient, and steady. The walls, once painted with runes of protection, were now home to framed photographs: Elias in his first tailored suit beside Cassian covered in mud and cookie crumbs; Bain holding baby Aragorn up to the sky like a lion king moment; Cassie glowing with joy, her crown of motherhood and survival etched in every line on her face.The estate no longer buzzed with alarms or magical barriers. The world hadn’t ended. No gods had fallen through the sky. No portals had cracked open. And yet… they had changed everything.Aragorn was ten years old now.He was tall for his age, with ash-blond hair like his father’s and haunting green eyes like his mother’s—eyes that seemed to glow whenever he was deep in thought.He had power. The kind that bent trees toward him in affection. That made broken things whole ag
The descent into the coastal cave felt like a funeral march through time.Cassie carried Aragorn wrapped in protective spells, the boy unusually silent as they passed jagged rocks carved with old sigils. Bain walked beside her, muscles coiled and jaw tight. Cassian, glowing faintly with his gift, clutched a worn map while Elias followed behind, his sword enchanted and humming with unease.Malthea led them with torchlight.Above, lightning split the sky. Below, the sea crashed like an ancient beast remembering its rage.“Are you ready?” Malthea whispered as they reached the stone gate.Cassie looked at her son, then at her husband.“Yes. We seal this. Forever.”The Mural.It wasn’t just a carving. It was alive.Stretching fifty feet tall, the ancient mural depicted eyes—thousands of them—crying black water. Beneath the mural pulsed a mirrored pool, rippling though no wind stirred it. The Mirror Heart slept beneath that water. It looked like nothing and everything all at once. A shimmer
ghtning arced across the sky as the Thorned Circle stood on the forest hill outside the New York estate. They had gathered in silence. The air felt heavy, full of salt, though they were miles from the sea.Seraphina was the first to speak. “They breached the third sigil. The ward that sealed the sea-bed.”Cassie turned sharply. “Already?”“It took Valeria’s cult nearly a decade to crack the first,” Bain said coldly. “Who’s helping them now?”“Someone… old,” Malthea whispered. “Someone we forgot.”Aragorn babbled gently on Cassie’s hip. When Bain reached to brush a finger across his dark curls, the baby’s eyes flickered gold for just a moment—and the clouds above shimmered.“They’re watching him now,” Elias said, tone grim. “Every ripple of his power rings like a bell.”In Greece, hidden beneath a monastery, Vulture unearthed what the smugglers had buried: an obsidian trident etched with runes. He didn’t touch it.“Seraphina,” he said into the glowing sigil, “you’re not going to like t
The sea was not calm.Not the surface — that was mirror-like, reflecting starlight and silence. But beneath, in the hollows of the Ionian trench, something pulsed. Something called.Cassian woke screaming.Bain, already dressed in black, stormed into his son’s room. “Cass?”Cassian was standing on the bed, palms glowing faintly, eyes rolled back.“They’re under the water!” he cried. “Sleeping, not dead — dreaming!”Elias arrived next, breathless. “The second gate,” he murmured. “It’s starting.”By dawn, the Thorned Circle was gathered again.Seraphina drew a map in light across the air: the Ionian Sea glowing red.“They are called The Drowned Kin. They were banished before the Hollow King rose, older than Valeria’s cult, older than the first relics.”“And now they’re waking?” Cassie asked, Aragorn squirming in her arms.“Because Aragorn exists,” Malthea said quietly. “Because light this strong shakes old shadows loose.”Vulture, half-awake, barked into the mirror-sigil from his remote
Months had passed since the fall of Valeria and the obliteration of the Hollow King.The world, strangely, had not ended.Aragorn was crawling now—his tiny hands brushing ancient runes without flinching, his eyes a shade of luminous gold not found in any book. Sometimes, when he babbled, lights flickered. Sometimes, the shadows paused. Once, the television turned itself on and displayed nothing but static—and Cassian quietly unplugged it without a word, then hugged his brother close.No one said it aloud, but they all knew: Aragorn’s powers were not ordinary. Not even among the gifted. Neither were Elias’s or Cassian’s.And that terrified them just enough to keep them watchful.Bain returned to New York quietly, seamlessly reintegrating into the criminal underworld. With Viktor at his side, operations resumed like a well-oiled machine. Clubs reopened, smugglers rerouted, and debt collectors went back to breaking legs. It was comforting in its brutality—a violent normalcy that masked t
The wind howled through the narrow corridors of the Pyrenees mountains as the Thorned Circle arrived at the forgotten temple where it all began. Nestled within rock and bone, the entrance to the Veiled Mural pulsed like a sleeping heart—ancient, wrong, and waiting.Bain stood at the threshold, flanked by Petrov and Sokolov. Behind them, Vulture barked orders into his comms, securing every access point with both enchantments and trained Brotherhood operatives. The mafia moved like shadows—efficient, lethal, watching the perimeter.Cassie held Aragorn tightly, wrapped in woven silk threaded with sigils of protection. Elias stood beside her, eyes narrowed, while Cassian stared forward as if the mural were whispering directly into his soul.Seraphina’s voice was steady.“The temporary seal we placed before has thinned. Something’s been pushing against it from the inside.”Malthea added grimly,“If we don’t sever it now—utterly—it will open.”II. The DescentThe group descended into the mu