“I didn’t know,” Fix said.
“You didn’t have to know,” she said. “Now put him down. If there is any chance of saving him, we need to do it now.”
“I don’t know what to do, Gwen.” He set Liam down on a metal table in the middle of the room. “It’s supposed to be a myth. The Thousand Curses. But here we are. They don’t die because someone else is cursing them to death. They die because they do it to themselves until they drain their magical core.”
“That’s quite a theory, Fix.” She was puttering around the room, pulling out crystals and pouches of dried herbs, candles and rune stones. “Are you sure?”
“I can’t be, but it’s the only thing that makes sense. And if I’m right, I don’t know if there’s any magic left in him. He was so scared. In so much pain, Gwen.”
He fell to his knees next to Liam’s head, picking up a limp hand and holding it to his lips. He kissed the backs of Liam’s cool fingers, wishing he’d been faster. Smarter. Wishing he’d been good enough to figure it all out sooner.
“I’ll do whatever I can, Fix,” she said. “If there is any magic left in him, we’ll make sure to preserve it. To keep him alive.”
“How?” he whispered.
“Let me see where we are first,” she said, arranging things around Liam’s body. The herbs went close to his feet, the candles by his knees. Crystals were placed around his chest and rune stones over his head.
“Why are we testing his levels, Gwen?” Fix asked as the seconds ticked by, bringing them closer and closer to whatever outcome awaited Liam. Good or bad, it was looming. Fix could feel it creeping. Too close for comfort.
Gwen reached into one of her pockets and pulled out an instrument he hadn’t seen in years. It was a retractable metal rod with sigils carved into the sides of it. She stretched it out and placed it next to Liam’s hip. She held it steady for a second before releasing it. It balanced on its thin end, humming softly.
The items around Liam’s body reacted to it.
The herbs started releasing scents into the air, the candles lit on their own, the crystals glowed, and the rune stones activated around Liam’s head.
“You’ll have to let go now,” Gwen said when the items started releasing that same glow Liam’s skin had been giving off before it dimmed.
“No, Gwen.” Fix shook his head. He couldn’t let go. He’d never let go. He didn’t want to think about the future where he might have to. If Liam… No. He shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Cursebreakers have magic in them, Fix,” she said. “If we want to see Liam’s, we can’t have yours interfering.”
“I…” Fix struggled to breathe.
“It’ll only be for a moment,” she said. “I’ll give you the go ahead the second you can touch him again. Fix, this is for his own good. Now. Let go!”
Fix tore his hand away from Liam just in time for the beams of light to spread from the objects around Liam and connect at a point just above his sternum. Converged into one, the beam shot up in the air, running parallel to the metal rod, lighting up the sigils carved into it one by one.
The lowest one glowed the brightest, but three more lit up, getting fainter the higher they went. Once the final sigil was glowing, the light beam burst into a blanket of pale blue shimmer, settling over Liam like mist. It looked alive. Sentient. It reached glowy tendrils toward Liam, brushing against his skin, winding into his hair.
Liam’s magic was just as beautiful as he was, Fix thought, watching it. He ached to think something so stunning could cause him so much pain.
“Level four,” Gwen said, observing the magic. “Decent amount of power he had.”
“Had?” Fix asked.
She nodded. “I’m afraid a lot of it was drained. He has enough left to be a level one now.”
“So it’s not gone completely?” Fix asked, something like hope cautiously creeping into his heart.
“No.” She smiled at him. “We got to him in time. We have to keep his magic from spilling out accidentally until he can learn to control it and he should be perfectly okay.”
Fix slumped in relief, reaching for Liam before stopping himself.
“You can touch him now,” she said. “I’ll put this away and we’ll see about finding a magic dampener for him.”
She folded the rod together and broke the bond it had with Liam’s magic.
The moment the focus wasn’t on the rod anymore, the magic went wild again.
