He was really trying to piss me off. Apparently, the things he’d found endearing about me before were just aggravating to him now— and vice versa.
I wasn’t the only one who harbored resentment. He clearly disliked me worse than he had in the beginning.
And we’d been around each other long enough to know every button to push. Oh,goody. This was going to be fun.
“Cut it out, you two,” Kallie said. “We’re here to practice our powers, not fight. We know that the locator spell worked, and about the vision you guys had, but we’ve gone over what they could mean, and we’ve hit a dead end. So if we can’t find the keys through the locator spell, why don’t we try working on our demigod powers?”
“But how are we going to do that when we don’t even know what they are?” Marcus asked. “They literally could be anything.”
“So we’re going to have to experiment,” Kallie said.
Alette fluttered out from behind her hair and began buzzing from flower to flower, collecting nectar. Rishi completely forgot about the fish in the pool and locked eyes on Alette, swishing his tail back and forth.
Kallie paced back and forth. “Let’s think. From our research, we know that demigods can manipulate reality, create their own energy, use more magical energy than others, and—Rishi!”
Rishi leapt into the air to try and catch Alette. Marcus balked, and Kallie gasped. She put up a hand instinctively, and all of a sudden— everything stopped.
The waterfall ceased to move. Sunlight froze in place, and particles hovered upon the air. All sound within the prison halted, bringing everything to a complete halt. Rishi and Alette paused in mid-air, as if stuck there. Nothing moved— except for the four of us and Oberi, who’d poked her head out of the water to see what was going on.
“What the hell?” Charlie asked. He’d noticed the abrupt halt of sound. He knelt by the edge of the pool and stuck his hand into the waterfall. It didn’t rush over his hand, merely rippled around it. The water particles drifted into the air, hovering for a moment before they halted in place.
“Kallie, did you just… freeze time?” Marcus strolled around. Kallie’s look was so shocked, she didn’t say anything.
Abruptly, everything went back to the way it was. Time began moving again— the waterfall resumed, and noise abounded at the prison. Rishi fell out of the air, and Alette zoomed back to the safety of Kallie’s shoulder.
“I think she did,” I said in awe. “She stopped time.”
“How’s that possible?” Kallie asked in wonder.
“Professor Mazur said demigods could influence time. It was one of their powers,” I said.
“But I don’t think all of us could do it. The way I understand it, demigod powers are like Elven abilities. You only get one special power per demigod, beyond the magic your race already provides,” Charlie said.
“Can you do it again?” Marcus asked.
Kallie snapped her fingers, and just like that, time froze. Everything halted, although the four of us, along with Oberi, could move around just fine. Rishi and Alette remained frozen, Rishi on the ground and Alette in Kallie’s hair.
“Demigods must not be affected by it,” I said. “We must be outside the boundaries of time. That’s wicked.”
“What about Oberi?” Charlie said, kneeling by the edge of the pool and stroking her smooth skin. “She’s not frozen, either.”
“Oberi’s amutabeecha. They’re spiritual creatures from the afterlife, much stronger than your average Familiar,” I pointed out. “It makes sense she’s not affected.”
Time resumed again, and Marcus stated, “I want to do an experiment. I’m going to walk out of the room and see if time freezes in the rest of the prison, or if Kallie only affects time around her.”
“Good idea,” Kallie said. She froze time again. This time, her shoulders slumped, as if she was getting tired.
I could understand why. This was extraordinary magic, beyond the bounds of what any supernatural alive could do.
Marcus hurried out of the Arboretum. He was gone for several moments, then came rushing back in when time resumed.
“When Kallie stops time, it looks like it freezes everywhere,” Marcus said. “Wherever I walked in the prison, time wasn’t moving.”
“Time is a concept, an idea. In reality, time isn’t a straightforward line. It’s happening all at once,” Kallie said. “It’s very similar to illusion magic, which is why I think I can do it.”
“Do you think once you enhance your powers, we could time travel?” My heartbeat picked up at the possibilities. Maybe if we could reverse time, we could go back and stop the Warden from finding Forevermore.
“I don’t know. I can’t hold it for more than a few seconds without feeling exhausted,” Kallie said. “Traveling through time itself, if it’s even possible, might kill me.”
