Thomas watched Sarah leave and had to fight the urge to follow her. This was his house. He should be the one to deal with problems like this. However, Sarah had had a point; Julia wasn’t going to listen to him right now.

Julia. Not for the first time, he wondered if it had been a mistake to let her join the house. Now, his apprehension seemed to be justified. Everything he had done to try to save her life, and she mistrusts and blames him for . . .

For Jason. It was because of Jason that she was even here. He’d insisted, refusing to join unless she did as well. So, Thomas had relented. Now, one of his oldest friends was gone, and that friend’s latest project had control of the house. Things were pretty sideways.

Thomas walked over to a table where a chessboard was set up. Jason always won their games. Thomas suspected he played by instinct rather than strategy, and while that sort of chaos seemed to work for his friend, he knew he couldn’t emulate it. Yet, the skills necessary to predict his opponent’s next moves eluded him, and he failed to master the game. The irony of that was not lost on him. Perhaps his own magic was too much of a crutch. Being able to see the actual future, he could never quite get the hang of relying solely on his own wits.

On the board was a puzzle Jason had left for him to work on. When he had finished setting it up, he had chuckled in that otherworldly laugh he sometimes had. Thomas stared at the puzzle; its solution once again escaping him. Now he would probably never know the answer. He almost reset the pieces, but decided to leave them for now.

Why didn’t Jason get the crystal to David earlier? If he had, David would have taken care of the mana worm. Rebecca would have saved him, and everything would have been fine. Jason’s own absent-mindedness did him in.

Even as he had the thought, the idea rang hollow. Maybe Julia was right. Jason’s fate was on his head. He had tried to cheat death, had been overconfident in his own cleverness, and all he had done was trade one death for another. Now he was in a future he had not foreseen, and he had no idea what might happen next.

Until Sarah made her attempt to get through to Julia, there was nothing for him to do, so he decided to explore this new timeline. Jason had sent them all down an unexpected branch. Thomas needed to begin planning now for whatever might be ahead. After one more long look at the chessboard, he turned to begin preparing the spells.