Tomas Thornwood's Arc

Chapter 8 of 12

The freed souls drifted into the trees and were gone. Tomas dropped the dead box in the shallows. Lucas Ashmore knelt in the mud, his power drowned, his scars gone dark. Once this fallen mage had overpowered Tomas with a flick of his hand. Now he could barely lift his head. He breathed. He lived. And Tomas stood over him with no idea what to do next. Auria came to Tomas's side, water soaking her boots. Her silver eyes moved from the mage to Tomas's face. She had warned him of this man in her cave, weeks ago. She knew what he had done. "He can't cast anymore," she said quietly. "But he's still alive. The curse won't truly die while its maker breathes." Lucas laughed, wet and thin. "So finish it," he rasped. "Cut my throat. Become what I am." He tipped his chin up, baring it. "You've hunted me for months, forest man. One stroke. Do it." Tomas drew his knife. Luca made a small sound behind him. The fox boy had lost his brother to this man's hound. He had every reason to want the mage dead. But Luca's ears were flat, his eyes wide with fear at the blade, not the mage. Tomas looked at the boy, then at his own hand on the hilt. Killing a helpless man would stain him the way blood magic had stained Lucas. He would not do it. But he could not let the man walk free either. Tomas sheathed the knife. He bent and hauled Lucas up by the collar. "You don't get an easy end," he said. "You get to watch me undo you." He dragged the mage into the running current, waist-deep, and forced his hands under. "Running water breaks what blood ties. Auria—the salt." She understood at once. She poured salt over the mage's scarred palms while Tomas held them beneath the flow. Lucas thrashed, then screamed. The dark marks on his skin loosened, thread by thread, and washed downstream like ink. The last threads of his blood magic dissolved into the lake. When it was done, his skin was only skin. An old, broken man knelt in the water, weeping, empty of power for good. Tomas pulled him to the bank and let him fall. "Arthur will decide what happens to you," he said. "You're the druid's problem now." Luca crept out and pressed against Tomas's leg. Tomas rested a hand on the boy's head. He had ended the mage without killing him. But over the water, the treeline stood silent where the freed souls had vanished. Somewhere in his woods, those lost spirits were loose now, unbound and afraid. The ring was clean. The mage was broken. And still something waited out there for him to find.