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I OPENED the envelope and smoothed out the folded sheet of paper that contained my sentence, my mission to join Valcas in his search for my father.
I sighed. “I can do this. I can’t run and hide from the Uproar forever. I might as well have stayed in Edgar’s Nowhere until he got tired of his youth elixir and decided to let us die...”
Mom winced, then nodded. “Either way, it doesn’t seem that you have much of a choice. Calla, I don’t have a lot more time today. We should discuss the additional members who will join your mission.” She softened, revealing a slight smile. “You’ve become such a strong young woman. I’m proud of you.”
I bowed my head, my cheeks flushing slightly. Mom was right. Many things had changed. I now knew that Valcas was responsible for developing my strength, the catalyst that helped me to discover and test my potential. He’d introduced me to time travel. He’d thrown me off the deep end—off a couple of cliffs, actually.
I chewed on the inside of my cheek. I didn’t want to give Valcas more credit than he deserved. But, without him, I probably never would have met Edgar or Enta, much less the past versions of Shirlyn and Romaso.
Valcas shifted uncomfortably in his seat. I looked up to see that he’d been staring at me. I cleared my throat and turned to Mom. “Yes, please tell me who the other people will be. How many of us are going?”
Mom pressed a button on the conference table. “There will be four members on your team,” she said.
A projector hummed as it warmed up before lighting the white wall across from where I sat. The first slide contained not a photograph of a person, but an animé drawing of a female figure. She appeared strong, lithe and fearless, from her stubborn jawline to her lean muscled limbs. Her short, tousled locks of hair were pure white. I recognized her immediately.
Valcas and I looked at each other and grinned.
“Ivory is from Sable’s homeland,” Mom informed me more than Valcas. “I understand that you already have some background about Valcas’ mother.”
I nodded, remembering Sable’s ethereal good looks and the bright emerald eyes that she’d passed on to Valcas, before he’d sapped them of their beauty.
“As you learned at the hearing,” Mom continued, “Ivory is a Chauffeur, a certified travel craft operator, the very best there is.”
“She also proves rather useful during hand-to-hand combat,” added Valcas with a dark chuckle.
“She is well trained.”
“Why is she a drawing?” I asked.
“Ivory refuses to have her photograph taken,” Mom explained.
“But she isn’t impossible to record,” added Valcas.
I smiled, remembering the zobascope and its successor technology, the travel glasses, both invented by Edgar. I made a mental note to myself to search for images of Ivory in my own pair of travel glasses, the ones that had been well used by Valcas. I hadn’t remembered coming across Ivory while browsing through the glasses previously.
I pouted my lips, wondering why Valcas continued to let me keep the glasses that contained his recordings. Why would he trust me with all of his thoughts and memories? I couldn’t imagine sharing such things with others. I shook my head and shrugged. None of that mattered now. We had Ivory!
“I feel safer already,” I said. “Who’s next?”
At the press of another button, a fair young male appeared on the projection wall, flaxen blond with dark blue eyes. My eyes grew wide. I’d seen him before too, just that very morning. The blond wore a slouchy green jacket layered over a white T-shirt and blue jeans. A glint of red peeked out from behind the sandy locks that covered his right ear.
“Benjamin Raymond,” Mom said. “He goes by the nickname Ray.”
“I have to object to this one,” said Valcas in a slow, even tone. “He’s too young. He’s barely Calla’s age.”
I looked at Ray more closely. He had somewhat of a baby face and could pass for a teenager still in high school. A shadow of stubble stained his jaw and chin.
Mom shook her head. “He’s already passed all of the TSTA’s tests, scoring higher than anyone else to date.” She sounded stiff, unyielding. “Ray also has the unusual ability to see during travel.”
I squeezed my brows together, remembering the blinding white light generated during travel, the Blanching Effect. The light was bright and painful. I couldn’t imagine anyone being able to keep his or her eyes open during that unless, of course, they were wearing the travel glasses. Then again, all of my experience traveling had been with the use of unofficial objects. I’d never used a licensed TSTA vehicle, the way Edgar and his family traveled to seventeenth-century Venice. I wondered whether the same blinding white light surrounded the travelers during transport. Edgar’s lecture on the Blanching Effect seemed to imply that the bright light would be present during any type of time travel.
“Is that so?” asked Valcas, interrupting my thoughts. “Is young Benjamin Raymond also useful in combat? We can’t afford another liability.”
I looked up at Valcas and frowned. He had to be hinting at me, liability primo. And he was right. I had no fighting experience, nor did I want to learn. But I felt compelled to say something on Ray’s behalf.
“Mom, Ray looks like someone I can trust. He sounds smart, too. A brain can be a powerful weapon.”
Mom smiled at me as Valcas huffed in exasperation. I raised an eyebrow at him. He looked uncomfortable, but I wasn’t sure why.