Editing Blake Thorburn (section)

===Void===
Blake and his allies trap their captive Laird inside a circle with [[Pauz]] as a guard, aiming to keep him from intervening further in the contest against Conquest. Attempting again to return to the police station to retrieve Blake's [[Frost Hatchet]], the party encounters members of the [[Sisters of the Torch]] who are working with the Astrologer in order to find him; Blake subdues them using the previously bound ghost of [[Leonard Harlan]]. The situation quickly turns sour, as the Shepherd arrives and empowers [[Wraith]]s to herd Blake and his allies outside a grocery store. A creation of the Astrologer then appears and seriously wounds both Alexis and Fell with a large bow and arrows.

[[Isadora]] then comes to fulfill her promise to attack Blake, and maims his chest with her claws. Rose convinces her to call Conquest and a severely wounded Blake negotiates a break from the match for three days, by pointing to the weakness that Conquest would show by allowing a subordinate such as Isadora to kill his opponent.

Asleep while recovering from his wounds, Ms. Lewis appears to Blake and urges him to stop holding back and call the firm if he needs it - if he does not do so, she threatens to hasten his death so that Rose will take his place, as the Sphinx predicted. When he wakes he finds that his friends had nearly bled themselves out to wake him up and plugged his wounds with [[Tallowman]]'s wax. Rose greets him alongside a dangerous Other, the recently summoned [[James Corvidae|John Pica]], and explains that their situation has been worsening. Fell was killed by the Astrologer's creation and, Rose explains, she has refused negotiations to retrieve his soul, on strategic grounds.

Blake suspects that Rose knows her position as heir should he die, but wants to believe she and (similarly suspicious) Maggie are his allies. Returning to his apartment, Blake finds that Laird has broken free and escaped, costing them their final victory. However, Blake asserts that he has realizd the basis of the Behaim's power and is now equipped to combat them.

To this end, after dealing with a group of [[Ghouls]] he, Maggie, Rose, and Evan end up being invited into Duncan Behaim's apartment by his fiance and take him hostage for the sake of getting Laird. The plan backfires as Laird arrives with Conquest, members of his family, and several Terracotta Soldiers. In the end he was forced to use the rest of June's power, destroying her, only to end up being confronted by two of his own ghosts and then taking the large splinter he was given to track the Abstract Demon and shoving it into Laird's throat.

Escaping outside and into the snow, Blake then works with Rose to convince Conquest that unless he can make her submit he can't win the contest. Conquest, unable to fight his nature, does so while Pauz threatens Blake, only to be deterred as it was now freed and did not wish to be bound again. Blake uses the pages of [[Black Lamb's Blood]], Laird's blood, and Rose's hair, to trap Conquest in a mirror inside of a triple-layer circle.

Evan and Blake have a talk about their partnership when the rest of the Behaims return to find Laird dead, and he argues in his defense that he tried not to kill him but Laird had pressed him too far, thus earning the ire of [[Craig Behaim]] personally rather than because of his family name. Once they leave, he and Maggie finish binding Conquest and then return to his home to await the rest of the Champions for Conquest, when [[Isadora]] arrives first alongside [[Paige Thorburn]].

It is revealed that Isadora has decided to take Paige, who was digging into the events of what was happening with Blake, under her responsibility to prevent her from being lost should something happen, which also has the benefit of making one less 'splash in the pond' if Blake dies. Blake deduces that [[Rose Thorburn Senior]] put her at the very end of the list because she was sexually attracted to girls and wouldn't have an interest in having a child to have a new heir. When the rest of the others show up, the [[Astrologer]] apologizes for attacking him claiming she was under duress and both the Grandmother and niece of [[Fell]] arrive, to whom he apologizes for not being able to save.

With [[Conquest]] bound he wants to call a truce and asks if any of them wants the position of replacing him as the [[Lord]] as all he wants to do it be left alone before he goes back to the factory and deal with the [[Abstract Demon]]. While the only ones open to taking the position were [[Elder Sister]] and possibly [[Jeremy Meath]], Isadora (possibly) and [[Shepard]] would continue to act against Blake. Later on he scouts out the factory with the demon in it from the outside and muses that someone has bound it inside of the building so it couldn't escape, but the demon's radiation was still escaping, and shares his belief that Maggie is possessed without her present.

He then visits the Astrologer, Elder Sister, and Shepard in order to have them give his consent so that he can use magic outside the constraints of the contest to deal with the demon. All three agree and later discuss whether or not Blake should get his [[Implement]] afterwards by using the Goblin Sword. They decide against it and then head to the factory.

At the factory he, with assistance from a ghost loaned by the Shepard and [[Terracotta Soldiers]] start a fire in an attempt to deal with the [[Abstract Demon]], but it hides in the smoke. Blake has Evan flee but, before he can get away, the demon eats his [[connections]] with his friends and the outside world. The last thing he mentions was that he tried to get away and didn't make it before he apparently died.