Rowan's lungs expelled his father's energy with a violent squeeze before filling once more with the air of his garden. Finally he could breathe, but he couldn't appreciate it.
A pain unlike anything he'd ever felt burst in his chest the instant the dagger severed his connection with his song. An overwhelming sense of emptiness rushed in after it.
A moan gurgled in his throat as he rolled to his side again, drawing his knees up to his chin as both his body and his spirit recoiled from the damage he'd readily inflicted upon himself.
Inside, he was falling, his very essence carved into a hollow vessel that would surely shatter the moment it touched the ground. His head spun as he tried to find himself in this body that no longer felt like his own.
Yet through the whirling tunnel of his vision, the butterfly held steady, a translucent spot of blue at the center of a blurred kaleidoscope.
