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Rowena stepped closer, cutting me off with a look. “Then we’ll make sure he never does.”

Her words hit me like a slap—sharp and final.

I opened my mouth to argue, but Lucas’s hand slid to my shoulder, grounding me. I glanced at him, at the fierce determination burning in his eyes, and my breath steadied just enough to speak.

“Tell me what we need to do,” I said.

Rowena nodded. “First, you need to rest. Your strength won’t hold if you push yourself any further.”

I started to protest, but Lucas squeezed my shoulder. “She’s right, Annika. You can’t fight like this.”

“But there’s no time—”

“Then we make time,” he cut in, his voice low but firm. “You’re not doing this alone.”

Rowena stepped closer again, her voice sharp with authority. She addressed Kael first. “You’ll come with me and help me prepare what I can. And you,” she said, turning to Lucas, “keep her safe.”

They both nodded, but I barely noticed. My focus had already shifted back to the weight pressing against my chest and the impossible task looming ahead.

“I need the Aetheris bloom,” Rowena explained, extracting a dried, crumpled leaf from one of the jars on a small shelf. It didn’t look like much of anything.

I stared at the brittle piece of greenish-gray in her palm. It looked fragile and somehow ordinary, but Rowena’s eyes burned with something close to reverence as she spoke.

“When combined with the blood of a witch,” she continued, her voice low, “it becomes the most powerful binding spell I have ever encountered. A spell capable of sealing even the darkest forces.”

I barely heard her. My focus caught and tangled on the words a witch’s blood.

My blood.

I swallowed heavily. “You mean me.”

Rowena’s gaze sharpened, pinning me in place. “You already know I do.”

“This spell…” My voice wavered. “It takes blood. How much?”

Rowena hesitated, and that pause said more than I wanted to hear.

“Enough,” she finally said. “It will weaken you, yes… but it won’t kill you.”

Her words didn’t comfort me. Not when I saw the flicker of doubt in her eyes before she spoke them.

Lucas stepped closer, his voice sharp. “There has to be another way.”

“There isn’t,” Rowena snapped, turning on him. “We don’t have time for alternatives. Aurelius is stirring, do you understand what that means? If he wakes fully, nothing willstop him. Not you, not your strength, nothing. This is our only chance.”

She turned toward Kael, who had been quiet through most of this, his arms crossed as he watched us.

“You’ll come with me,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

Kael didn’t argue, just gave a sharp nod and stepped toward her.

I wanted to ask how long it would take, how much time we had left, but the words caught in my throat.

Instead, I looked at Lucas. He was already looking at me, his expression torn between anger and worry.

“We’ll be back before nightfall,” Rowena said.

Then she and Kael disappeared out of the mouth of the cave, leaving us alone with nothing but silence and the weight of what was coming.