The girls turned to the man again and put their hands over his chest. Red smoke slowly slipped from their fingers and disappeared into the fabric of his jacket.
They were using their magic on him, and I couldn’t find it in me to even consider it might bewrong.In fact, I almost wished I had their kind of magic so I could put all my efforts into it, too.
Hearts could manipulate emotions. Of course, the older the person, the stronger he was, and the more practice the more precise the magic, and the more minutes in one’s chronobank, the more powerful the effect.
But above all, magic respected magic, so if a person’s defense was strong enough, it wasn’t going to go through with whatever spell you wanted to cast.
Here, though, it wasn’t an issue at all. The man, even if he were strong enough to keep himself safe from Heart magic sober, was too drunk right now to even realize what was happening. Here, it didn’t matter that Helen and Levana were only eighteen—their magic was powerful enough because they had Life Clocks full of Sparetime to use.
Before the minute was over, the man was chuckling,meltingthere on the chair as the girls, and the rest of the Hands, asked him more and more questions, simple ones—about how he grew up, if he had pets, if he had children, what his favorite food was.
I was holding my glass with both hands as I watched, teeth gritted, eyes unblinking and on the thin lips of the man whose eyes were so red I doubted he could see anything anymore. But he could still talk. We didn’t understand half the things he said, but he understood the questions.
Levana said, “Tell us aboutus,Mr. Revin! Tell us, what do you think about the trials so far?”
“Exquisite!”the man shouted with a fist raised over his head, and it was almost funny how he sounded, how he nearly fell off the chair with the sudden movement.
But Helen put her hand over his shoulder and releasedmoremagic onto him, and he immediately calmed down.
“Yes, it was. This wholeunwinningthe games business is really something. So special,” she said with the sweetest smile as she batted her lashes at him.
“Special, special indeed. Time moving backward—what times, what times,” the man muttered, half his wine spilling down the corner of his mouth when he took a sip.
“The forward trials weren’tthatspecial, I’m sure,” Levana then said, and all of us around the table moved as if we were of the same body, leaned closer, strained our ears…
“No. Not special at all,” the man said, half nodding, half shaking his head.
“There must have beensomethingyou liked in the forward trials, though, Mr. Revin,” Helena cooed. “C’mon, tell us what it was!”
“Or better yet,whowas your favorite Hand then? Your secret will be safe with us, I promise,” Levana said.
“Yes, Mr. Revin, tell us,” said Seth from across him.
“We’d love to know,” said Russ, and we all hung onto the next moment while Mr. Revin looked from one to the other, smiling like all his dreams had come true.
“Oh dear, oh dear—what a pickle!” the man said. “I-I-I had no favorites, of course. You were all so brilliant, so brilliant!”
Something inside me clicked, like a lock turning, only there was no door to open.
Tell us,the others continued.Tell us who, we won’t be mad…
But the man finally blinked his eyes and straightened upin his seat, and he seemed to just now remember where he was and what he was doing.
Levana and Helen had no choice but to sit back on their own chairs, too, their smiles faltering.
“No favorites, indeed,” Mr. Revin said. “And I’m afraid I’ve overstayed my welcome, honorable Hands. I must take my leave so others may-may-may-may—” He burst out laughing. “May-may—may-kyour acquaintance!”And he laughed some more.
“No, please, Mr. Revin, stay,” Helen said. “It’s a party, after all!”
“Parties, parties—so much for parties,” Mr. Revin said, and holding onto the edge of the table, he stood up. All of us stood with him—he couldn’t leavenow.We were all thinking, trying to come up with a way to make him stay, make him say more, but… “The last timeyouwent to a party, you paid such a hefty price. I must say I felt oh, so sad…”
Everything came to a halt again.
“What party?” I asked, together with a few of the others.
But Mr. Revin was already trying to find his way around the chair—which was right behind him—so he didn’t hear it. “Time’s Temper, it was sad indeed—I almost cried. Such a hefty, hefty price…”
“What price?” Levana demanded.
