I had timewalked us to Rome, into the Colosseum. The dead center of the Colosseum—complete with gladiators brandishing weapons, and beasts prowling all around.
And a few feet away, a lion, thin but with a bushy orange mane stared us down as he crouched to pounce.
CHAPTERFIVE
My blood pounded in my ears as we eased our way backward. With every step we took, the lion responded by creeping closer, his amber eyes trained on us.
“What are we going to do?” I hissed.
I glanced around the stadium. We’d drawn attention. Romans were screaming and pointing, some even looked to be cheering for us—or maybe the lion, there was no telling. The gladiators we were in the ring with didn’t seem to have noticed our appearance, but they were fighting their own beasts.
“I’m going to try something. Don’t run or cry out,” Morgan whispered seconds before the dirt around us kicked up as if we were in the middle of a sandstorm.
I choked on the whirlwind of sand and closed my eyes to protect them. The predator tracking us growled, presumably because the dirt was irritating him too. I was about to ask Morgan what she was doing, when her hand landed on mine, handing me something.
A blade. She’s a damn genius. She’d wanted to hide overt conjuring from the humans in the stands. Now they’d probably assume that we had them on our hips, or in the folds of our dresses, all along. In regards to magic, humans usually saw what they wanted to see.
The dirt and sand fell to the ground, and I wiped my eyes clean to locate the lion. Morgan stood by my side, an even larger sword in her hand.
She kept her gaze firmly on the big cat as she spoke. “We can’t use much magic, certainly not for fighting. If we do, the crowd will go crazy. Even the dirt cloud was risky, but you need time to figure out how to survive. This sort of thing can happen when you timewalk. So how are you going to get us out of it?”
I gawked. “Me?” I had been about to ask why she hadn’t already created a warphole for us to slip through.
“This is a prime lesson. If you can’t work under pressure and get yourself out of trouble that you’ve stepped into by timewalking, you don’t deserve to wield the power. Get us back home—quickly.”
Did I think Morgan was a badass earlier? I actually meant crazy. Totally batshit crazy.
The lion roared and took two more steps forward.
I gripped my sword tighter. “What about the time strands? I don’t know which one to pick.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught her nod. “When you can get that far, I will choose one. But I won’t call time for you.” Her blue eyes darted to me for a second. “Don’t make this timewalking excursion your last.”
The lion leapt, and Morgan and I twirled apart, screams ripping from both of our throats.
“Work fast, Odette! And only use magic to make the warphole and call time.” Her hand gestured to the crowd. “Or they might drag us out of the arena and burn us alive.”
I gulped. Morgan was right. Being a witch may not always be a desirable prospect in the world I came from, but historically? It was deadly. Just like the lion we were up against.
Morgan charged the beast. She swiped at its face, and the big cat flinched backward and batted at her with his paws. Morgan moved again, this time coming at it from the side and pushing the creature back.
I took advantage of the space, lowering my sword and getting to work. The visualization was easy enough. I knew where I wanted to go . . . to the salt circle. The warphole was easy too.
As a blackhole ringed with fuchsia spun into existence, screams and cries of astonishment flew up from the stands. One glance up told me that we had the arena’s attention. I had to work fast.
I pushed harder, searching for the threads of time.
Men yelled close by, and I twisted my neck to find three gladiators running toward me, swords extended and scowls on their faces.Shit!Were they coming to help? Or because of the magic they’d seen? Something told me it was the latter.
My warphole dissipated.
I darted to Morgan’s side. “We have company.” I gestured to the gladiators.
She swore beneath her breath. “Start working again. As soon as you have the strands up, I’ll assist, but not a moment sooner.”
I complied, straining through my fear to reopen the warphole and call strands of time into existence. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the lion swipe, his claws coming close to Morgan’s arm. My terror surged, and the threads of time flitted away. Tears sprang to my eyes as I pushed again, and again, and again.
Finally, after what felt like a decade, a single orange strand of time popped into existence.
