Page 138 of Incoronate
“We thought you were dead,” said Anita, not even bothering to say ‘hello’ first.
“Nope, not dead,” I answered as Dominic and Trace settled on either side of me. “Just touring Sanguinarium.”
Annabelle’s brows shot up into her fringe and disappeared completely. “You’re lying.”
“I’m really not.”
She huffed. “Nobody comes back from Sanguinarium.”
“And yet.” I spread my hands.
Anita’s eyes sharpened with something that looked, briefly, like actual interest. “How did you get out?”
“It’s a long story.”
“We have plenty of time,” said Annabelle as she crossed her arms and smiled at me.
“I don’t.” I turned back to Anita. “We need your help.”
Annabelle pressed a hand to her chest. “Big surprise.”
“What do you need?” asked Anita, the curiosity still present but practical now, redirected.
Before I could answer, Arianna spoke.
“She wants to go back.” Her voice was soft and distant, the way it always was when she was pulling something from somewhere the rest of us couldn’t access. Her amber eyes hadn’t moved from mine. “She wants to go back and stop it from happening. Stop Ares from dying.”
The room went quiet enough to hear the crickets outside, the sound drifting in through the open glass panels.
Annabelle broke silence first. “Considering one of your boyfriends is a Reaper,” she said, her gaze lingering on Trace for a few seconds too long, “I’m going to assume you understand exactly how time travel works. And what doing something like that could mean for you.”
I decided to ignore the googly eyes she was making at Trace on account of the fact that, well, I needed her. “I have a plan. And I know it’s going to work.”
Annabelle’s eyes narrowed, something sharper moving behind them now, the humor draining away as she studied my face like she was trying to decide whether I’d lost my mind or finally found it. “That’s either the most tenacious thing I’ve ever heard,” she said slowly, “or the most catastrophically stupid.”
“Why limit ourselves, Ann. I can call you Ann, right? Can’t it just be both?”
“Call me Ann again and I’ll hex your vocal cords.”
A cold shiver moved through me, knowing she absolutely could. “That works too,” I muttered under my breath.
“What exactly is the plan?” interrupted Anita, ignoring both of us.
“Right.” Drawing in a steadying breath, I laid it all out as best as I could for her.
I told her about the initial port, the swap that would involve past me coming onto our Timeline while I went back onto hers, taking everything I knew with me. I told them about the Ripple problem and why a straight port wouldn’t hold. All of which they already knew. And I told them about my Alt and what she’d done, and the gaps we couldn’t close on our own.
When I got to the part where I needed them, I paused and glanced at Trace. He picked it up without missing a beat,stepping forward and laying out the finer mechanics the way only a Reaper could.
“The transfer itself isn’t the problem,” said Trace, his arms still crossed, his voice unflustered. “The problem is the stabilization after. Without something to lock the new Timeline in place, it’ll try to correct itself. And when it does, it’ll rip her right out of it…or worse. We need something to stop that from happening.”
The sisters listened without interruption, taking it all in. When we’d finally finished, Anita’s brow furrowed, her fingers tapping once against the edge of the table as she thought it all through.
“This is no small feat,” said Anita at last, her hands resting flat on the altar table.
“I know.”
“You’d be breaking every natural law the Order has set around sanctioned time travel. And several that predate them.”
