Infinityglass (Hourglass 3)

“A scroll?”

“Not the old-school kind. A digital storage device, kind of like a tablet on steroids, with holograms.” This specific Skroll held information about the Infinityglass, and had changed hands too many times to count. “The Hourglass stole the Skroll from your wife. She never managed to get it open. I did.”

It had taken me two weeks to crack it.

“Do you still have it?” Girard asked.

“No. We gave it back to your wife. I have everything that was on it. And I left it altered. Now it’s missing some vital documents.” Taking information off the Skroll had been a gamble, and one that could have cost lives. From where I sat now, the risk had been worth it. “The information on this Skroll is the key to the Infinityglass. I’ve read through everything I can, and I’m in the process of translating the rest. There’s centuries of information to cover.”

“You’re here because a man I trusted deeply believed in you.” He looked at Liam. “All I’m interested in is what being the Infinityglass means to my daughter.”

Liam gestured to me. “That’s why I brought you Dune.”

I nodded. “Finding out is my goal, sir, and I’m one hundred percent committed to it.”

“If you work for the Hourglass, you have an ability. What is it?”

I swallowed, hard. “I can control water. The tides. Moon phases—that’s how it’s connects with the time gene. It’s not something I mess with very often. Too hard to control.”

“Yet you come to New Orleans. ‘Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.’ ” The man had been in my presence for all of five minutes, and had already zeroed in on one of my biggest fears and quoted “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” in the process. “How are you going to handle the mighty Mississippi so close by?”

“I don’t plan on spending much time by the river. Or lake. Or the ocean. Nothing volatile. If working for you requires me to do so … I’ll find a way around it.”

I didn’t look at Liam. He knew what a job involving that much water would do to me. The last job I’d been on for the Hourglass that involved my ability had been the previous summer. A tiny country stream had required a reroute from a floodplain. I’d shaped the water as I controlled it long enough to move it to the new trench that had been dug. Then Nate and I had helped fill the now-dry section of creek bed with clay mud.

I’d acted like it was simple, no problem at all, but I’d seen a dead fish on the grass, a result of my shoddy navigation, and I’d had to fight off panic.

“I don’t foresee a circumstance in which your being on the water would be necessary. Unless you can’t handle the pool in the back.”

“That’s not a problem.”

Girard sat back in his seat. “Tell me what you know about my business.”

I gave him the short version because I didn’t know how to approach the long one. “You deal in rare antiquities. People with time-related abilities assist.”

“Succinct. Diplomatic. Nice.” Girard crossed his ankle over one knee. “The Hourglass has a very high bar when it comes to morality. I acquire antiquities under certain furtive circumstances. If you’re going to come to work for me, you are, indeed, going to work for me. Jobs that could cause the wrong sorts of people to ask questions. Are you prepared to answer them?”

I didn’t know if the wrong sorts of people were the good guys or the bad. Paul Girard had no time-related ability, but businessmen like him were genius judges of human nature. Uncertainty wouldn’t do in this situation.

“I’m prepared.”

“Good. Ideally, I can keep you out of that end, since your main purpose is helping my daughter. But if it becomes part of your cover, so be it. I don’t want Hallie to know what you’re really doing here.” He stared at me and I nodded, confirming I was totally on board. “I told her I was planning to hire new security. We’ll let her believe you’re part of her new detail.”

“I don’t—I have no idea how to be a bodyguard. I don’t even know how to fake it.”

“It doesn’t matter. I rarely have anyone on her in the house. She’ll be really, really pissed off, and my daughter, pissed off …” He looked at me like he felt sorry for me.

“Does she have any idea she’s the Infinityglass?” Liam asked.

“Her ability is transmutation. I don’t believe she knows she’s the Infinityglass.”

Liam’s frown went wrinkle deep. “Do you plan on telling her?”

“That depends.” Girard asked, focusing on me, “Do you have answers for her?”

“I need to observe her for a little while. I need time to try to reconcile the differences between what I thought the Infinityglass was and what it truly is and to finish translating and studying all the information on the Skroll.”

“Then we’ll wait until you know something solid. I don’t want to scare her with half-truths.” He stood, and so did Liam and I. “If Liam says you’re my best option, I’ll believe him, because I have every reason to believe in the Hourglass. I know what you stand for and what you do. But if you prove him or me wrong …”