One more. The djinn watched, but still didn't try to stop me from freeing Alex…
"You're wrong about Elias." My voice came out steadier than I felt. "He chose me before fate intervened. He wants me exactly as I am."
"Did he?" Marcus circled us then, his power pressing against my consciousness from all sides. "Love based on pity is still just pity, little Threadwalker."
"Stop talking." I grabbed the final chain with both hands. This one fought back, burning my palms with cold fire that had no business existing.
Alex groaned. "Talin, please. Just go."
"Not without you." I poured more magic into the binding, feeling it resist and drawing from the circle in Aunt Judy's living room. The magic here was layered. Marcus's djinn sorcery was twisted around Alex's own blood, creating a lock that required both their powers to open.
"I can't break this one," I whispered to Alex. "Dammit. What do I do? And don't you dare tell me to leave."
The cavern shuddered. Cracks appeared in the impossible walls, revealing nothing beyond them. Not darkness. Not light. Just absolute absence.
"You're running out of time," Marcus said pleasantly. "This dimension is collapsing. And when it goes, everyone anchored to it goes with it." He shrugged. "Well. At least you'll die together."
I looked at Alex. Really looked at him. Kenya's mate. Alice's twin. My cousin. His golden eyes met mine, and I saw acceptance there. Resignation.
"Don't you dare give up," I said quietly. "Kenya is dying, Alex. Do you hear me?" Grabbing his shoulders, I gave him a shake. "She's dying."
The cavern shook harder. More cracks appeared, spreading like spider webs across surfaces that shouldn't have existed.
"Make your choice, Threadwalker," Marcus said. "You can continue to try to save Alex and doom yourself and your mate. You can flee and let him die. Or…" He held up one hand, power swirling around his fingers. "You can accept my offer. Join me. Let me teach you to use your abilities properly. I'll free Alex, anchor both of you safely, and give you everything you've ever wanted."
"No."
He looked so affronted, it was almost comical. "Just like that? You won't even consider it?"
"I'd rather die than become like you."
The djinn's expression hardened. "So be it."
He raised his hand, and the cavern's collapse accelerated. The cracks widened. The nothing beyond them pulled harder, trying to drag us into oblivion.
Elias! I screamed across the threads, reaching for him blindly with one hand while I held onto Alex with the other, wishing there was some way he could reach through the dimensions and pull us both out.
The cavern continued its death spiral. The floor beneath us fractured, sections falling away into the hungry void.
Marcus watched me with open interest, curiosity as to what I'd do plain on his face.
With a snarl, I grabbed his thread.
Not the thread connecting him to this dimension. Not the one anchoring him to the real world. I grabbed the thread that bound him to his own past, to the choices that made him what he was, to the moment he chose power over love and sealed his fate.
And I pulled.
Marcus screamed. His form flickering, becoming translucent. "What are you doing?"
"Giving you what you wanted," I said. My hand burned, the pain unlike anything I'd experienced, but I wouldn't let go. "You want to change the past. To save your Alice. To undo your mistakes."
There was genuine fear on his face. "You can't—Threadwalkers don't have that power?—"
"You're right. I don't." My vision blurred, the thread cutting into my palm like razor wire. "But I can show you every path you didn't take. Every choice that could have saved her. Every moment you could have chosen differently. Until it drives you mad."
I tangled them around him. All the possible futures where Marcus saved Alice instead of killing her all those years ago. Where he chose love over vengeance. Where he became something better than the monster standing before us.
He collapsed to his knees, slapping his hands over his ears, his power wavering as visions overwhelmed him. "Stop. Stop!"
