Well, and one other thing, I amended, as the gnarled old limbs of a tree exploded into flower as we passed.
I turned around while still running, watching through pelting rain as the massive trunk shrank, old bark became new, twisted limbs straightened and flowered and hung heavy with life. It would have been beautiful, except for the knowledge that a blast of reverse time like that wouldn’t do me the same good. Would, in fact, age me right out of existence.
Good thing she couldn’t see me any better than I could her, huh, I thought, right before something like the sun suddenly flooded the area all around us. Something exactly like, I realized, staring up at the darkened sky. And at a patch of icy slush the size of a house that had just been replaced by clear blue skies and fat, happy-looking clouds.
Damn, I didn’t know we could do that, I thought, as the light of another day shone down around us, out of some type of time portal I didn’t understand because I didn’t understand much about this job. But if the idea was to turn a searchlight on us, it was doing okay, I thought, and jerked Pritkin into the shade of a nearby bridge.
“What the—” he began, staring upward at the shimmering beam that was sparkling off the water, and throwing moving shadows of tree limbs onto snow-covered streets as it started moving around, looking for us.
“New magic?” I said weakly. And received a frown in return, because Pritkin isn’t stupid.
But before he could work it out, something like a speedboat tore out from under the bridge, drenching us with freezing spray.
I hadn’t seen who was driving it, but I guess Pritkin had. Because he swore and dragged us down a rusty ladder into a small dinghy, which seemed kind of useless since it had no form of propulsion that I could see. Outboard motors didn’t exist in 1794.
But magic did. At least, I assumed there was some sort of spell involved when we zipped out into the canal, so fast that it sent me tumbling into the stern and had the prow of the boat leaping out of the water, barely touching the waves. But we were doing better than Rosier, who I saw when I scrambled back to my feet, just ahead of us.
He was in another speeding boat, courtesy of his big bag o’ tricks, I supposed, but whatever he was using must not have come with instructions. Or steering. Because he was weaving back and forth along the narrow waterway, his boat hitting other boats and the high brick walls of the canal and basically anything and everything in his path, making his frantic face and waving arms kind of superfluous.
Yes, I knew he was in trouble.
But then, so were we.
Because the makeshift searchlight was now chasing us, flowing along the sides of the canal like bright water. The portal looked like an oval of colored film imposed over the black-and-white landscape around us, some avant-garde cinematography about youth and age. Behind us, skeletal trees became green, snow melted into leaf-strewn streets, people strolled along the shore enjoying a bright spring day.
And then stopped to stare through the portal at us, including one guy who ran into a tree.
I stared back as time boiled along a line just behind us, bisecting day and night. And summer and winter. And the bottom of our boat, sending me scrambling frantically into the front and Pritkin cursing and somehow incr
easing our speed.
It worked, sort of. We jumped ahead, all but flying now, with a sound like the crack of a mighty whip. Or, I realized a second later, like half a boat splintering and breaking and falling away.
I stared behind us through my wildly flying hair as what had been the back of our boat was swallowed by that other day, bobbing and listing and then sinking in bright spring sunshine. And realized that we weren’t going to be any better off soon. Half a boat doesn’t float well, and only our crazy speed was keeping us momentarily above water.
I looked around frantically, trying to spot Rosier, planning to shift us onto his vessel, which at least was still in one piece. But it was dark ahead, even without the glow from behind obscuring my vision. And the sleety half rain, half snow was coming down harder now, making it almost impossible to—
And then Rosier made it easy by crashing headlong into the back of a barge.
It sent him hurtling out of his craft and through the air, and I grabbed Pritkin and shifted even before he landed. We ended up right beside him, which would have been impressive—if I’d remembered to leave our broken craft behind. But we were still clinging to the sides, so our boat had come, too, and for a second there, it was skipping along the long, unladen surface of the barge, right beside a falling, cursing, and rolling demon lord. And then Pritkin reached out and grabbed his father. And I shifted us again, about a second before we would have plowed into the back of the captain’s cabin.
So we plowed into one of the small bridges that spanned the canals instead.
That actually wouldn’t have been so bad, since our little half craft had managed to land on top. But then we kept right on going. I screamed and grabbed Pritkin, who was clutching Rosier in a death grip but manfully keeping silent. Unlike the elegant demon lord, who was yelling right along with me as our momentum carried us across the narrow span, which was little more than a brick arch sans railings.
And off the other side.
And into a patch of bright sunlight and the front of a larger boat being guided along by a still-dripping Pythia.
“Well, hello,” she said, smiling at me evilly, as I looked up from a pile of demon.
“Well, good-bye,” I gasped, and kicked her into the canal.
Our tiny boat shuddered and shook as Pritkin got control of it again. And then abruptly detached itself from the Pythia’s stately barge. And skittered off down the canal, through the early-morning sunlight of that other day that had now engulfed us, with Rosier clinging to the bow, Pritkin holding on to him, and me drowning along behind, my body half in the water as I gripped an oar I’d snared at the last second and hung on for dear life.
I tried to pull myself up, which would have been easier without all the kicking and scuffling feet in my face. And without being slung back and forth wildly, because no one seemed to be driving this thing. But then I forgot about all that; I forgot about everything.
Because I’d just looked up.