The silence after Barry's escape was a physical weight in the clearing. The mist, churned by the departing skiffs, clung to the scorched earth and broken trees like a shroud. Jaden Crimsonwood stood amidst the wreckage of his own making, his chest heaving not from exertion, but from the aftershocks of a pain so old and deep it felt carved into his bones.
The agents gave him a wide berth. They saw the way the blue-black shadows still licked at his boots like restless hounds, felt the unstable energy radiating from him. He was a bomb that had already detonated once and was threatening to go off again.
He could still feel the ghost of Barry's blood-shadow strike against his chest. It hadn't hurt—their shared lineage ensured he could weather such blows—but the feeling of it lingered. The raw, untamed power. The very essence of what he needed. What he deserved.
"Why do you get to have everything? The power? The girl?"
His own words echoed in his skull, taunting him. He saw Barry's face, not as it was now—hardened by years of survival—but as it was in the garden. Laughing. Carefree. Always the one who drew their mother's eye just a second longer, whose unique eyes were called 'beautiful' while Jaden's were merely 'interesting'.
The memory was a poison. It twisted together with the more recent one of Annie's hand going limp in his, the two greatest losses of his life forming a single, agonizing knot of envy and grief.
A sleek, black skiff descended silently, landing a respectful distance away. Agent Jade emerged, her posture rigid, her jade eyes assessing the scene with cold professionalism. She said nothing, simply waiting for his command.
"He's stronger than the projections indicated," Jaden said, his voice flat, devoid of its usual theatrical lilt. He wasn't talking to her, not really. He was vocalizing his calculations. "The blood magic is… visceral. It responds to emotion. His emotional control is his primary defense."
Jade remained silent. She was a tool, and tools didn't offer opinions.
"Greimore wants a report," she stated after a moment. "He is… impatient."
At the mention of that name, a flicker of the old, performative smile returned to Jaden's face. It was a mask over the hollow ache. "Tell his Lordship that the key is turning in the lock. My brother's control is fracturing. Every time he uses his true power, he leaves a piece of himself behind. And I will be there to collect it."
He turned his eerie purple eye toward her. "The girl, Belinda. She is the lever. Barry's one remaining tether to his humanity. We need to acquire her. Separate them. Isolate him completely."
Jade gave a curt nod. "It will be done." She made to turn back to the skiff.
"Jade," Jaden's voice stopped her. It was quieter now. "The… solution Lord Greimore promised. The one that will work after I harvest the power. The details are still secure?"
A barely perceptible pause. Jade's gaze was unwavering. "The solution is absolute, sir. Lord Greimore's archives on life-force transmutation are without equal. Once you possess the full spectrum of the blood magic, the path to restoring your lost love will be clear."
Restoring. The word echoed in the hollow chamber of Jaden's heart. It was the only thing that kept the howling void inside him at bay. It was the single, shining promise that made the monstrous acts worthwhile.
He nodded, dismissing her. As her skiff lifted into the air, he was alone again with his thoughts.
The path will be clear.
The words should have been a comfort. Instead, they felt like ashes in his mouth. He saw Annie's smile, heard her laugh—a real, warm sound, not the hollow imitation he now performed. Could magic, even this forbidden power, truly bring back something so pure? Or would it only create a puppet, a golem wearing her face?
The doubt was a treasonous whisper, and he crushed it instantly. He had to believe. The alternative was to admit that Annie was truly gone, that he was alone, and that everything he was doing—hunting his own brother, serving a monster—was for nothing.
He needed a distraction. He needed to feel in control.
He turned and walked toward the makeshift camp the Order had established at the edge of the woods. A unit of new recruits, young and eager to prove themselves to Lord Greimore, snapped to attention as he approached.
"Sir!" their leader barked.
Jaden didn't look at them. His gaze was on a training dummy lined up across the field. "The primary target is agile, unpredictable, and possesses a unique form of kinetic magic," he stated, his voice taking on the cold, instructive tone of a lecturer. "Standard containment protocols are useless."
He raised a hand, his hands still tucked in his pockets. Shadows, the color of a deep-space void, bled from the ground around the dummy. They didn't attack. They slithered around it, encircling it, studying it.
"You must disrupt his focus. Break his rhythm. He thinks in straight lines." The shadows suddenly lashed out, not at the dummy, but at the ground beneath it, upending it and sending it tumbling through the air. "You must be chaos."
The recruits watched, mesmerized and terrified.
One, a little bolder than the rest, spoke up. "Sir, how do we fight chaos?"
Jaden finally turned his head, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face beneath the mask. "You don't."
With a flick of his will, the shadows condensed into a dozen spears and impaled the dummy from every conceivable angle, shredding it to pieces in the space of a heartbeat.
"You succumb to it," he finished, his voice a whisper that carried across the entire field.
He turned his back on the stunned, silent recruits and walked away, leaving them to their fear. The small, violent act had done nothing to fill the emptiness. It only made it louder.
He found himself at the edge of the woods, staring into the same darkness that had swallowed his brother. The jovial mask was gone. In the quiet, he was just a young man, unbearably tired and alone.
"I'll do whatever it takes to bring her back."
He had meant it then, in the hospital's shadow. He meant it now.
Even if the price was his soul. Even if the Annie that returned would look at the monster he had become and scream.
He clung to Greimore's promise like a lifeline, the only thing tethering him to this side of madness. The promise that it would work. That she would be whole. That she would be his.
Somewhere, in the deepest, most fortified vault of Greimore's stronghold, a girl with quiet brown eyes slept a magic-induced sleep, unaware she was the engine of a coming war.
And Jaden Crimsonwood, the smiling hunter, continued to march toward his own damnation, believing it was his only path to salvation.