I remembered the exact moment the shift happened.We had fallen asleep in the master chamber just as we always did, entwined beneath the heavy blankets, our breathing falling into a synchronized, familiar rhythm. There had been no sudden gasp, no pain, and no fear. Just a gradual, beautiful deepening of the sleep, as if the physical boundaries of our skin were gently dissolving into the mattress, melting into the very stones of Thornwood itself.When my eyes opened, that heavy, aching weight of my one hundred and sixty-two years was entirely gone.My hands, no longer thin and trembling with age, smoothed over skin that felt supple, vibrant, and young. The emerald veins beneath the surface pulsed with a steady, eternal bioluminescence. I was still sitting at the edge of the great clearing, but Thornwood had transformed. The grass beneath me glowed with an ethereal, iridescent light, and the twilight sky above had bloomed into a canvas of endless, shimmering starlight.Beside me, three
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