Thalor's fingers curled slightly at his side—an involuntary echo of the tension that had just raked through him.
He didn't look shaken. He wouldn't allow that. But beneath the smooth surface of his expression, behind the casually lifted chin and the polite half-smile, his thoughts were snapping into order with surgical speed.
The spell…
It wasn't just any charm, any idle manipulation. It was his own creation—Scion's Thread. A tether woven not from raw mana, but from intent—concentrated, balanced, intimate. It required more than power. It demanded focus. Singular focus.
Every spell of that caliber came with cost. For Thalor, that cost was concentration. Not a problem, usually. He could pin a soul to the floor with a smile, so long as nothing interrupted him.
But in that moment—just one blink, one flicker of attention—
He'd lost control.
Not because Priscilla fought back. No.
Because Lucavion had slipped into the space behind her like a shadow he hadn't accounted for.
