Her mind raced for compromises, for anything that would make the violence unnecessary. “Listen. Once Mycor’s stable, we can formalize a transfer. A new pact, a binding, whatever it takes. We stabilize the Grove Core, you’re compensated,Jonah’s brother gets his legacy, the rezoning still goes through. Everybody wins.”
She turned to Splice, hope clinging to her like a warm coat. “Splice? Right? We can do that, can’t we?”
Tamsin let out a long, indulgent sigh, like a hostess humoring a foolish guest. “Yes, that would be one solution. But I don’t want things healed. I want the Grove Core to collapse. Completely.”
She spread her hands as if presenting a diagram. “Plan A was surgical. Remove Marlow, rattle the remaining trustees, then position myself as the only one who could stabilize things. Let them come to me, begging for a solution.” Her smile was razor-sharp. “There’s a certain advantage to being one of the most powerful witches in the state, after all.”
Her jaw tightened. “Marlow’s dead-man switch ruined that. So I moved to Plan B: total collapse. Look at the pattern: council members slipping into comas, the land’s pulse stuttering, the Thornfather wasting away. It isn’t a coincidence. The old binding is fraying. When those ties snap, the Land Trust collapses with them. If the Core fails, every old claim unravels. Ledgers, pacts, inherited privileges, all gone in a single fracture.”
Her smile widened, small and victorious. “And when the dust settles? I step forward to ‘save’ the Holdings. The Ashenvale deal collapses. Uproar follows. When the smoke clears, Bellwether will need a steward. I intend to be the only person left with both the credibility and the leverage to claim it.”
She set the final stone into place, completing the intricate pattern on the ground. Straightening, Tamsin dusted her hands and clapped once. “Well then,” she said brightly. “There we go. I think we have everything.”
“B-but you said you didn’t want us to do the ritual,” Goldie stammered, words snagging in her throat.
Tamsin turned. Her smile never wavered; if anything it grew colder, harder. “Oh, I don’t wantyourritual, dear. This is adifferent one.” She swept a hand to the salt circle at her feet. “This one is about erasing inconvenient bodies.”
Jonah looked at Goldie. “Does it have to be both of them? Couldn’t we just take out the plant man and leave her? She’s clever. We could bring her around. You said she had potential.”
Tamsin’s smile thinned to a blade. “No. I’m tired of dealing with loose ends.”
Her hand shot out toward Jonah.
A bolt of black energy slammed into his chest with a wet, cracking sound. Jonah’s breath locked in his throat, his spine bowing backward in a silent scream. For a moment he hung there, rigid and trembling, then collapsed, his body folding in on itself like a puppet with its strings cut. Goldie stared, horrified, as a thin trickle of blood slid from his open mouth and dripped onto the mossy floor of the Grove Core.
Chapter
Forty
Tamsin brushed her hands together, brisk and businesslike. “Well. That’s that. Housekeeping.”She spared Jonah’s unmoving form a single glance before lifting her gaze to Goldie and Splice, her smile cool and satisfied.
She strode to the edge of the circle, her gaze cool and appraising. From a sheath at her waist, she drew a slender knife, its blade of polished obsidian catching none of the light. Instead, it seemed to drink the glow around it, swallowing the last of the evening’s color.
“Now. I believe it’s time to begin.”
“Wait!” The word tore from Goldie’s throat, raw and desperate. Her mind raced, heart slamming against her chest. And then, in the whirling terror, something caught. A single, desperate idea. Fragile. Terrible. But it was something.
“Please,” she gasped, latching onto that spark like it was the only solid thing left. “Before you do this… can I at least say goodbye to him?”
She turned to Splice, her voice cracking. “Please.”
Tamsin stilled, head tilting in something like weary affection, and her eyes showed a flicker of genuine regret. “You know,” shemurmured, “I really do like you, Goldie. I wish you hadn’t forced me into this position.”
A small, indulgent smile curved her lips. “So, yes. Say your goodbyes. I’m not completely heartless.”
With a casual flick of Tamsin’s hand, the silver bonds binding their arms unraveled, though the magic pinning their feet to the ground held firm.
It was enough.
Goldie lunged to Splice’s side, wrapping her arms around him in a fierce, trembling embrace.
He was rigid with contained fury, every line of his body straining against the silence that smothered him. White fire flickered weakly in his eyes, frantic and unstable, stuttering as he tried to reach the Thornfather. But the bond was failing. They were cut off. Alone.
Goldie pressed her cheek against the cool, bark-textured line of his jaw, lips brushing his ear. In a whisper, she spoke her last desperate gambit.
“Bite my lip. Hard enough to bleed.”
Splice drew back just enough to meet her gaze. The frantic white flicker in his eyes steadied and sharpened.
