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One of the guards ahead signals sharply toward a rusted steel door hidden between old transit pipes, half concealed behind darkness and crumbling concrete.

Blood streaks across the floor beneath it.

For one horrible second, the entire corridor tilts beneath me. Then I’m moving before anybody can stop me.

Several guards appear farther down the corridor, blocking the way toward the final steel door at the end.

They don’t notice us at first, too busy arguing beside old transit pipes while cigarette smoke curls through the dim underground light.

“Go.” Dad shoves my shoulder forward. “We’ll cover you.”

I barely hear the rest before the corridor explodes into gunfire. Shouts tear through the tunnels while Lucan and Rafe move beside the guards and Cassian’s men open fire from the opposite side.

One of the men reaches for his weapon, but I shoot him before he can fully turn around.

I don’t stop moving. Somewhere behind me, Dad is shouting orders while Marius covers the corridor and somebody crashes hard into the wall beside the pipes, but all I can focus on is the steel door at the end of the hallway.

Rowan. Every instinct inside me knows he’s behind that fucking door.

A guard lunges toward me from the side corridor and I slam him backward hard enough that his head cracks against the concrete before grabbing the weapon from his hand without even slowing down.

“Ciaran!” Dad shouts.

I ignore him.

The lock shatters beneath the first shot. Then I’m shoving the door open so hard the rusted metal slams against the wall.

The smell hits me, blood and cold metal and fear thick enough to coat the back of my throat.

My entire body locks in place.

The figure slumped beside the chair at the center of the room doesn’t even look like Rowan anymore. A Noctis lies discarded nearby beneath the weak overhead light, one broken string hanging loose, dark blood smeared across the wood and strings.

Rowan is crumpled on the floor beside the chair, rope still hanging from one wrist. Bruises stain the pale skin of his throat, so dark they almost look black beneath the dim light. His mouth is bloodied, one side of his face swollen badly enough that I can barely recognize him at first, and his hands⁠—

Fuck. His hands. Blood streaks across his fingers and knuckles, swollen and trembling faintly even now like his body still remembers the strain of playing long after he physically stopped.

The broken sound that leaves his throat when his body shifts hits harder than the blood.

All I can see is him sitting beside me in the tower with those same careful hands resting across the Noctis while he explained finger placement I wasn’t really listening to because I was too busy watching him.

Now those hands are covered in blood.

And for a breath, I think I’m already too late.

The gun slips from my hand before I even realize my fingers stopped holding it. Then I’m on my knees in front of him so fast the impact cracks painfully through them against the stone floor.

“Rowan.” My voice breaks so badly I barely recognize it myself. “Fuck. Mouse⁠—”

My hands shake when I touch his face, terrified of hurting him even more. His head lolls sideways against my palm without reacting at all, his skin freezing beneath my fingers.

His skin is too fucking cold, and panic tears through me until I stop hearing the gunfire outside altogether as I press shaking fingers desperately against the side of his throat, searching for a pulse.

I can’t find anything.

No. Not him.

Then something finally flutters weakly beneath my fingertips, uneven and fragile, but there.