Timespell (3 page)

She didn’t know why, but her face grew warm. She closed her eyes, shutting out the guy’s haunted eyes and the doomed look on his face as he had melted away into oblivion.

“Where is the third?” Indira asked.

Julia sighed with impatience, her eyes flitting open. If they had found the last Daughter of Fate, wouldn’t they have brought her here?

Angie sent her a scathing glare.

“What?” Julia whispered.

“Be respectful,” Angie said under her breath before turning to Indira. “We are still looking, mentor. We will not give up.”

Indira nodded, moving her hands over the crystals in front of her. “Let us work on your powers, then.”

The crystals began to glow, but Julia held back. “Wait, I think I can do it without them.”

“Good,” Indira said. “Hold the present, Daughter, and freeze time.”

Julia placed her hand in Angie’s. Her mark of magic shot a bolt of heat through her. She glanced at the candles. They no longer flickered. She listened, and noticed the absence of crashing waves in the distance. Everything had gone completely still. “Time frozen. Booyah!”

As usually happened when they used their powers, Indira was nowhere in sight. Julia stretched out on the cushions, feeling like an Arabian princess. “Do you think Indira would notice if I borrowed this purple crystal? It would look dead-ass awesome with my prom dress.”

Angie’s eyes widened and her voice dropped to a scandalized whisper. “You can’t take things just because time is frozen.”

“I’d bring it back next week,” she said. “Never mind. So, what now? Should I practice Journeying or do you want to give your Voyaging power a try?” They hadn’t actually time traveled yet because it took too much power for the two of them to do alone. Until they found the final Daughter they could only look around in the past like purposeless ghosts, though that was still pretty cool.

Angie didn’t answer, staring down at her hands.

“Hey, what’s wrong? Is it the whole David thing?” She should have kept her big mouth shut. The sight of Angie’s big blue eyes
welling with tears would be too much to bear. “Listen, I’m really sorry—”

“No, it’s not that. It’s just, my grandmother trained with Indira. She couldn’t figure out who the other Daughters of Fate were and her magic faded.” She glanced up, her gaze soft. “It seems like the same thing will happen to us.”

“No way. Geez, where is this even coming from?”

Angie lifted one shoulder in a limp little shrug. “Just facing facts. We have to acknowledge the possibility that the Fates’ selection process involves our elimination. There are other Daughters out there, somewhere. Only three in a generation are the Fated ones, and they might not be us.”

Not the Fated ones? “I don’t want to hear this stuff anymore. I’m not acknowledging anything and neither should you!”

Angie frowned. “Why are you yelling?”

“I’m not!” She lowered her voice a little. “I’m not.” Her mind reached for encouraging words, but she wasn’t used to being the one to convince Angie of anything. Usually, it was Angie with all the answers. Fine, so Angie’s birthday was the day after prom, and fine, their powers would fade forever if they didn’t mark the last Daughter before then, but they were probably really close to finding her. She shoved back the hair from her face and held out her hands, ready to unfreeze time. “The Fates are just testing us or whatever. As long as we keep trying, we’ll find her.” She watched Angie, a lump of worry forming in her throat.

“Just remember,” Angie said softly, her face angling down, “whatever’s meant to be is for the best.”

Julia couldn’t agree. Not a hundred percent. “And you remember what Indira says. We choose our own fate.”

Before Angie could respond, the power flowed between them. Julia closed her eyes and allowed it to rush through her. She was getting good at freezing time. After only a moment of shared emotion everything came back to life. The ocean crashed, the candles flickered, and Indira appeared with the flow of time.

“This is good,” Indira said, “Your powers are coming more
naturally. After you find the final Daughter, you will be ready to fulfill your destiny as true Daughters of Fate.”

Julia felt a headache coming on. Two days suddenly did seem like a short amount of time. They needed to find this girl, mark her, and then bring her to Indira for the ritual that would bind them to the magic—and each other—forever.

The thought of keeping her magic forever sent a thrill of excitement through her. She could never muster the same hatred of the Sorceress that Angie could. The lady was the reason why she and Angie had awesome powers, after all. The Sorceress had once been a priestess, one of many blessed with magic. She had gone nuts with the power, thinking she could summon demons across the elemental plane to overthrow the Fates. So the Fates had condemned her to the recesses of the nether, and that was the end of her for a couple of centuries.

Julia never understood why the Fates didn’t just off the lady. Angie said the Fates never actually “off” anybody. Apparently they left the dirty work to their priestesses.

“Are you ready, Evangeline?” Indira asked.

Angie’s lashes lifted. Her gaze held traces of worry. “Mentor, forgive me for intruding on our training, but I have something to ask.”

Indira inclined her head. “I am here to serve.”

“I know the duty of finding the Daughter of Future lies with us, but if you could use your sight once more, maybe you can find out what we’re doing wrong?”

Julia raised her eyebrows. This was rarely helpful. Indira’s sight only saw complete randomness as far as she could tell.

Indira’s good eye gleamed. “Of course. I will summon the winds of time.”

She lifted her arms. Julia glanced around as an unearthly breeze blew through the tent, making Indira’s robe-like dress rustle and the jewels in her hair glimmer.

“Evangeline, you are Past,” she said, “and Julia, you are Present. Do you understand who you are searching for?”

“Gee, I wonder who?” Julia mumbled.

“Be respectful,” Angie hissed again, and then added, “Yes, mentor. The girl who will be Future.”

Indira raised her arms high. For a moment, both of her eyes burned with white light. When she spoke again, her words were slower than usual. Julia eyed the sputtering candle flames as the wind stilled.

“Future remains out of reach. Always hidden. She is someone with whom you are familiar. Look in the places you have been.”

Julia shook her head. The magic eight ball failed again.

“You mean,” Angie said, her pale brows coming together, “we missed her somehow?”

“Future is the youngest of the three.”

Angie’s lips parted. “Oh ... it could be a girl who just turned sixteen? Someone who was fifteen when we first tried to mark her with the magic?”

“Yes,” Indira said.

“I call bull,” Julia said, ignoring Angie’s gasp. “Why does our magic fade when Angie turns seventeen, then? If the future-girl is the youngest, shouldn’t it be when
she
turns seventeen?”

Indira shook her head. “All three Daughters must be sixteen at the time of the sealing. Your grandmother, from whom you inherited the magic, was not alive to mark you and awaken your powers. Evangeline marked you, so your magic is dependent on hers, just as the final Daughter’s magic will be dependent on yours.”

Julia’s headache came on a little stronger.

“Once Evangeline’s magic fades, so will yours.”

“Okay. I get it ... I think. We do want our powers, so we’re going to have to hustle.”

Indira became motionless. “Daughter of Present, the powers are to be used in service of the Fates.”

She nodded. For the most part, she understood it. They were the Fates’ little helpers. Rule number one: keep the Sorceress trapped in the nether at all costs. The Sorceress had figured out
how to access the mortal realm by creating portals. The threads of time rippled over past, present, and future and the Sorceress looked for periods of chaos and destruction; those were the most easily manipulated for her purposes. The portals allowed creatures of Mythos into the world, since the magic binding creatures to the nether wasn’t as strong as the curse on the Sorceress. Julia didn’t remember why the creatures had been banished to the nether, but from what Angie said, they were all too happy to serve the Sorceress as a way out. Each death at their hands empowered the Sorceress, and she was determined to gain the strength she needed to challenge the Fates.

Being a Daughter was like being a time traveling super hero, heading into the past to handle the creatures of Mythos. As long as the portals were sealed, the Sorceress would be stuck in her netherworld prison forever. And best of all, when the Sorceress wasn’t causing trouble, the Daughters could use their magic however they wanted.

“I await your return,” Indira said, kneeling in front of the low wooden table. She opened the aged box where she stored their talismans and began putting them away.
“With
the final Daughter.”

Julia blinked back her surprise. Usually they spent a whole afternoon freezing time and trying to Journey. They hadn’t even worked on Angie’s power.

“We have accomplished all that is necessary, Daughter,” Indira said, fixing her sightless eye on Julia. “The rest is up to you.”

Julia dropped her gaze. She couldn’t look into that white eye for very long without feeling uncomfortable.

“Thank you, mentor,” Angie said.

“Yeah, thanks,” Julia said, not too thrilled with the fact that Indira could read her mind.

Indira never really smiled, but her expression was as close to a smile as it had ever been. “At your service, Daughters.”

Julia held open the tent flap for Angie. “Now what?”

Angie stared at her blankly. “What do you mean?”

“We have no idea who the third Daughter is, your birthday
is Saturday, and prom is Friday.” She dug her fingers into her hair. The magic was important, but it wasn’t the only thing going on in her life. “I haven’t even finished prom shopping yet. You saw my dress. I need some killer shoes, not to mention a wrap or something to hide this thing.” Her fingers skimmed the mark on her arm. It was hard enough to hide it from her mom even when it wasn’t blazing bright white with the magic of the Fates.

“Maybe you can find something here,” Angie said brightly.

A bearded guy looking as old as Moses roller skated by. Julia moved out of his way, eyeing the beach vendors hopelessly. This was not the place to find prom stuff. “Want to go to Santa Monica?”

“No. I have to really think about all the girls we know who might be the final Daughter of Fate. If I have time, I also want to go over my history paper.”

Julia skidded to a stop on the sandy boardwalk. “Are you
kidding
me? All this Daughter of Fate drama and you’re worried about a stupid history paper?”

Angie put on her sunglasses. Her lower lip formed a soft pout as her head tilted down.

“Sorry,” Julia muttered.

“It’s okay. I just want to do well. It’s worth forty percent of our grade and ...,” she trailed off. “I worry too much.”

“No, you’re right.” She gave Angie a sideways hug. “Magic won’t get me into college.” Or would it? She would have to think that one over.

Angie smiled up at her. “Want me to help you out with your paper? I could look over your outline.”

Julia never understood Angie’s way of thinking. Doing an outline was like doing the work twice. “I have a better idea. We could freeze time. Then I could check out prom stuff and still finish my history paper.”

Angie’s lips parted. “That isn’t what the magic is for.” She placed her hand on Julia’s arm, using the power of Convey to
share her thoughts.
We’re not supposed to use our powers to cheat or steal. We’re supposed to be the protectors of time.

Fine, no using our powers for schoolwork. But we can freeze time so I can do a little prom shopping, yes?

Julia felt Angie’s hesitation like a bubble pressing in on her mind. Her friend’s thoughts swirled around ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ and possible consequences.

Please?
Julia begged.
What’s the point of having awesome powers if we can’t use them for our own selfish reasons sometimes?

Angie tucked her hair behind her ear.
Okay, but only for shopping. No ‘borrowing’ anything from the store.

“Sweet!” Julia drew in the magic while they were still touching so she could freeze time.

“Not here.” Angie’s voice dropped as she added, “We have to find somewhere hidden, otherwise when we unfreeze time later we’ll be somewhere else, and it’ll look like we disappeared.”

Julia didn’t see what difference that would make, but she couldn’t argue when Angie’s big, worried eyes stared up at her. Not as long as she got to use the magic, anyway.

F
rozen-time shopping was the best kind of shopping. Julia tried to convince Angie to let her freeze time at the library so she could do her history paper too, but that was a definite no-go. She was stuck at home, figuring out the stupid paper on her own time.

She sat on her bed, the laptop screen still blank after two hours. Shouldn’t she be looking for the final Daughter with Angie? Why did this history paper even matter? She checked the teacher’s guidelines for the fiftieth time. Five to seven pages comparing and contrasting the French and American revolutions. Maybe four pages plus a title page counted as five.

“Mija,
get to bed,” her mom called.

“I can’t. I have a paper due in history tomorrow.”

“Julia!” Her mom’s face appeared in the doorframe, her mouth
turned down. “I’m not writing you a note this time. If you’re late for school, you’re on your own.”

Julia glanced down at her title page and added the date. “I’m already done with the first page.” She typed up the beginning of page two.
The French and American revolutions were the same and different in many ways.

“Many,
many
ways,” she added. She clicked open the window on her computer where her research was going on. She had started with typing “French Revolution” into a search engine. This led her to Marie Antoinette, which then led her to some of the most beautifully dressed women she had ever seen, which then led her to a site about the influence of French fashion through the ages, and the whole time she kept imagining herself in a gorgeous gown and gloves, dancing at a ball with a mysterious, silver-eyed stranger.