Chrysoprase (The Chalcedony Chronicles)

by B. Kristin McMichael

  “What doesn’t change?” I asked, humoring him, though my gut told me to just slap him and walk away. That was the least he deserved for ditching me at my junior prom, forcing me to call my mother to give me a ride home after everyone left and I was still there alone. Sure, Logan. You’ll be right back. That was the last time I believed that lie.

  “Party is going, and I find you in the library. You were never one for crowds,” Logan replied, stepping closer. He was finally close enough that I could see his violet eyes in the room’s dim light. Along with his magical house, he had magical eyes. All the girls would talk about his strangely colored eyes. They weren’t blue, but truly violet. Those violet eyes were busy studying me with a hint of humor in them.

  I wanted to deny that was me, but I couldn’t with him. I had dated him for two years, and he knew me quite well. At least, he knew the former me quite well. My reply ended up being a shrug. I looked back down at the nearest book for a distraction. I stared hard at the words on the page. The elegant golden lines swirled around the pages in Celtic knots. Even this book felt like I could read it, if I knew how.

  I finally looked up at him. He was still staring at me. It was a bit unnerving, actually. It was as if he was looking for a secret on me. I had secrets all right, and a few more now than when we were together, but I still wasn’t about to tell him about them. In fact, I couldn’t tell anyone about them. If I told someone I could travel through time, I knew exactly where I’d end up: locked away in a mental ward. People would think I was crazy. Heck, even I thought it was crazy, but that didn’t matter now. I wanted to get Seth back, so, crazy or not, I was going to time travel back to find him.

  “Maybe some things do change,” Logan added quietly after assessing me.

  I turned away from Logan and his intense stare and walked over to the large picture windows on the wall next to me. I looked out over the evening Chicago skyline. Lights blinked all around and up into the air on the tall buildings. It was a city horizon. I looked up into the sky and could only see a few faint stars. I missed Minnesota at that moment, and I missed all the stars. I never knew how many stars were in the sky until I moved away from the city.

  Logan slowly trailed behind me. I watched in the dim reflection on the window as he stopped behind me. I felt the heat from him being too close before he stepped beside me.

  “Is it possible that we can start over?” he said quietly.

  “Start over?” I asked. That wasn’t what I was expecting to hear from him. I was glad I wasn’t drinking. I probably would have spit it all over him.

  “I’d like to be your friend, Mari. I’ve missed you these past few years. I know that I hurt you pretty bad, and I deserve every hateful thing you’ve ever thought of me, but I was hoping that there was a chance we could just start over, as friends,” Logan watched the city skyline with me. He was poised and collected. Like he had practiced this conversation before.

  A weird bit of déjà vu came over me. It was as if I had had this exact conversation with Logan. It wasn’t in his library, but somewhere else. He asked then if we could start over just the same way as he did now. I shook off the feeling. This was the first time I had seen him in over two years. Maybe I had a dream about it. Probably right after we broke up, and I was still desperately in love with him. That had to be it.

  “Friends?” I asked. “Just friends?”

  “Yes, just friends.” Logan turned and gave me his million-dollar smile. “Unless you want more,” he suggested with a grin. “I’m just kidding,” he added at my hesitation.

  I wanted to say no as his eyes were hinting that there was something behind his “just friends” comment, but I didn’t have a reason to keep him away any longer. I wasn’t still pining over him. In fact, I had moved on completely. While he would always make my stomach flutter a little, he was my first love after all, I didn’t feel the need to be with him. When I fell asleep at night, I dreamed of being in Seth’s arms now. When I woke in the morning, I thought of Seth. I was completely in love with Seth.

  “Sure,” I replied with a shrug.

  Logan smiled and looked back to the city. I didn’t know why that would make him happy. I was going back to school in a day or two, and would be miles away, but I wasn’t about to ask. Something in his eyes told me there was more behind his question than I wanted to know. One thing had not changed in all the time that had passed, Logan Jones was still planning something.

  Chapter 3

  Time Travel Try

  “Welcome home, roomie,” Sim greeted me while I pushed the door open with my foot because my hands were full of stuff I was bringing back. I was surprised to see Sim. She had actually made it back before me.

  My first semester in college had been great because Sim was my roommate. It was nice to get back and see a friendly face. She wasn’t going to tease me about being at Morton or in Minnesota. She was genuinely happy to see me. I welcomed the change from being home and seeing my old friends. They would always be my friends, but Sim would be the one that understood the me that I became at college.

  The drive had been long and gave me way too much time to think. All I could do was wonder about Seth. Why didn’t he make it back? Was he safe? Could I go back to that exact moment and save him? So many of my questions were still unanswered, I needed to find a way to control the time travel and make it to him, but I didn’t want to just run off as I had before. I was naïve to think I could just go to the past and walk away from it with him. I knew better now. I had learned my lesson. The past isn’t something you mess with lightly. I needed a plan, and for that I needed Ty. He would help me. Maybe he even knew what went wrong.

  I stumbled across the room to my bed and dropped everything. It was nice to be home. After living in the dorms for months, the little room we shared felt more and more like where I belonged than Chicago, and Amy just solidified the feeling by dragging me off to a party. My room back in Chicago would always be home, but this is where I lived my own way. It had been hard to say goodbye to my grandfather, but he reassured me that he would be fine. He was a tough old man, and he was right, but he missed my mother as much as I did. I had to get her back for his sake, if not mine.

  “Did you have a good break?” Sim asked hesitantly. “You know, the first one without your mom,” she added quietly.

  I nodded. I forgot for a moment that everyone thought my mother died this summer. It was nice that the goddess didn’t erase her completely like she’d done with Seth. I must have told Sim that same story in the alternative universe that happened when she left. I had been slowly regaining memories for the past few days. I remembered how the past happened with Seth in it, and then some memories were starting to show the same situations without him in it. I hated having two memories of most events in my life. It was confusing and annoying at the same time. Most of my memories were identical to my previous memories, but with little details that were different because Seth supposedly didn’t exist. Also, anything relating to my mother was different. It would take time to sort through everything, the fake and the real memories.

  “We survived. How was your break?” I asked back. Obviously she didn’t want to upset me with talk about my mother. And yes, it was upsetting me. I didn’t just lose her over the summer; I had lost her only a week ago. The feelings were still too raw.

  “Typical Singh family Thanksgiving. My parents try way too hard to be American,” she said with an eye roll.

  I could imagine that. Her parents seemed very Indian from when I met them, her mother only wore saris and her dad wore a turban every day, but all the stories Sim told me from her childhood made them out to be ultra-patriotic.

  As I unpacked, I made sure my new carnelian lines were visible. Sim didn’t even say a word. It was strange as the lines were getting darker in color, and I was sure they stood out. My skin was quite pale and I burned easily in sunlight so I never had a tan. The carnelian lines were now a reddish-brown color.

  “Have you talked to Ty at all?” she
asked. She was trying to just throw it in the conversation, but I knew Sim well enough by now. Her voice even cracked a little when she said his name.

  In my old memories Sim and Ty were my two best friends, but my new memories have Sim with more than a little crush on Ty. It was weird to see life both times. It wasn’t that I didn’t want my two best college friends to get together. In fact, they’d make a cute couple, but even I knew Ty’s life was a little too complicated for him to have a serious relationship, and I didn’t want Sim hurt. Now I wasn’t really sure how to handle the new memories.

  “I haven’t talked to Ty yet. You know, no cell phone,” I answered, pulling my sleeve back to expose the whole line. Sim watched me and said nothing.

  “Exactly. What’s wrong with him? It’s abnormal to not have one,” Sim complained. She wouldn’t have called him if he did have one. When Sim really liked a guy, she got very shy.

  I got the very distinct feeling that Sim couldn’t see the lines on my arm. I was going to ask her how to lie about them to people, but if Sim couldn’t see them, I was going to bet everyone else not connected to time traveling and the goddess couldn’t either. It was one more secret, but an invisible secret is much easier to keep than a real one.

  We soon began talking about random things as I unpacked. After the long drive I was exhausted. We chatted until I needed to sleep because I was too tired to talk any more. I had plans for an early morning. Ty would be up early, and I would be, too.

  All our talking made me feel normal again, but it was far from the truth. I’d never be normal, and I could never be happy without Seth. I needed to be with him in his time, or mine, and I was going to find a way how. I doubted Ty could teach me how to time travel, but I couldn’t leave him out. He was as much a part of this as I was. Together we would get everyone back. I knew it.

  I woke long before Sim would even crack an eye open. Sometimes it was good that she wasn’t a morning person, as I didn’t need to come up with an excuse for visiting Ty early in the morning. From our talk last night, she was interested in him, and I really didn’t want her to think that there was anything like that between us. She had no memories of Seth, so she couldn’t remember that he was the one I was looking for every time I walked on campus. I wouldn’t see him, but the memories of the erased past were still stronger for me than the new past. Those all felt like a dream.

  As quietly as I could, I quickly dressed warmly and headed out into the light snow. Campus was completely dead at early morning hours the last day of the break, like it should have been. If I wasn’t set on my goal, I would have been sleeping in, too. We now had a week of classes and finals before the semester was done. Everyone was taking this slight break in the hustle of the end of a semester. I couldn’t take a break. I was on a mission. I had to learn how to go into the past to bring back Seth and my mother.

  I hurried across the frozen, silent campus trying not to think of my old memories. Everything was packed in my mind in a big jumble. New memories and old memories of the same situation were both there, and I was beginning to question some of them. They were similar, yet still different. It was just too confusing. There were new memories, but since they were fake, I didn’t care to remember them. I tried not to let them take over. Seth was real. My first semester of college, where I fell in love with him, was real. The other stuff was not. I kept repeating that to myself as I walked.

  It didn’t take me long to make it to their house with my feet on autopilot. It was the same as when Seth first left. I had been there too many times to not be able to make it there without thinking. It was his house, but still I could feel the joy of the three best friends missing. There were only a couple lights on. It looked sad. It felt empty now.

  “I never really took you for this early of a morning person,” a deep, gruff voice said from behind me.

  I turned and threw myself into Ty’s arms. Until that moment, I still doubted that even he made it back. The goddess took everyone from me. It was hard enough to deal with the loss of my mother and my boyfriend, I figured it was possible Mr. Sangre misspoke, and I’d have to deal with the loss of my best guy friend, too. Sim and Ty made college for me. My world wouldn’t have been the same without them both in it. College would have never been the same.

  “You’re really here,” was all I could reply. I didn’t want to let go, like he would just melt into the past like everyone else.

  Ty patted my back. “Yes, I’m really here, and you’re really frozen. Let’s get inside.”

  I let go and tried to discreetly wipe my eyes. I couldn’t help getting a little misty. I really thought I was left completely alone. They had left me alone before, and I felt like it would be that way again. They were from the past. They had to go back at some time, but I just didn’t want that yet, or maybe ever. Someday I would be alone in the future, but for now I had Ty. I wasn’t alone.

  Ty opened the door to the house and pretended not to see my tears. I liked that part of him. He let me be a girl and never teased me about it when I had a moment here or there. I followed him inside as he went upstairs to his room. At least the house looked lived-in again, even though I knew Seth and Dee weren’t here. It was harder to come back to than the first time they had left, seeing the place without them. There was nothing left of the three boys, and the house looked immaculately new that time. Not this time at least. I let out another sigh. That meant that Ty was really here. Even if I saw him walking in front of me, I figured that I could have just been hallucinating from the cold.

  “It’s kind of weird,” Ty said, sitting down on his bed. I sat on his window seat across from him. He was still in his running clothes, but I obviously had interrupted him. He wasn’t even sweaty.

  “I know. I keep getting confused,” I replied. I tucked my feet under me. I guess I was a little frozen. That was the bad thing about walking around in a Minnesota winter. You didn’t want to let your mind wander and stay out too long, or you’d end up like I was: just a bit cold.

  “Exactly. It’s like I have two memories of everything. Well, most everything. And I don’t know which one is real sometimes,” Ty answered, describing exactly what I was feeling. “You should see how strange it is to have two memories of the same football game. It feels like I drank the funky water and everything is just blurred together.”

  I laughed for the first time in a week. I was grateful to have Ty around. He was the only one that could understand exactly what I was feeling, funky water and all.

  “Oh, I know which ones are real. I find the second ones more annoying than anything. It’s like someone hijacked my brain without my permission. I mean, who has the right to change my memories?” I complained, picking up a chocolate-colored pillow and threading my fingers through the tassels. Even his room was exactly the same as before, decorated in brown tones.

  “Exactly what I was thinking. It’s like my first memories weren’t good enough and someone is trying to make new ones. Why didn’t I get to choose the memories I wanted to have?” Ty replied, taking off his shoes. Guess he wasn’t going for a run now.

  “Oh, I’m choosing, even if it’s a dream world now. They are much better than the new ones,” I replied, and Ty smiled. He knew exactly what I was talking about: Seth. I couldn’t help the blush that crept into my cheeks. I didn’t mean just those memories, but yes, being kissed by Seth was better than any of the replacements.

  “I don’t think I could ever get used to this. I mean, think of how Mr. Sangre deals with this all the time? It would drive me nuts,” Ty said.

  “But weren’t you guys the first ones he took on to pretend to be his own children?” I asked. I didn’t know that this was something he dealt with. I thought he brought people into the past or future, and then left them to do what they needed to do.

  “Yes, but that was because he didn’t want to oversee us constantly for as long as we needed to be here. Normally people only come for a few days, or maybe weeks. He checks in on them often, and watches over them. I guess i
t’s part of his job, making sure they stay safe and don’t change major historical events and all. But with us, we were told we would be here for years. He decided to just call us his children and be able to go on dealing with his other travelers,” Ty explained.

  “Then every person he helps travel, he knows what they are doing and when they will go back?” I had assumed it was more you stayed until your mission was done. It changed everything if people were given a set time. I had to wonder who set the time. Was it the goddess, or the person bringing them back?

  “I guess,” Ty replied. Then he realized my question and added, “Why?”

  “Do you think if I bring someone back that they will have a limited time if they don’t go through Mr. Sangre?” I replied. Could I keep Seth and my mother in the future, and not have to worry about them disappearing?

  “You’re going to go get them?” Ty asked.

  “Yes. I can’t leave them in the past,” I replied. “I need to learn how to time travel.” I wanted to see how Ty would respond. He leaned over to the side table and grabbed something.

  When he turned back, Ty grinned. “And I’ll be beside you the whole way.” He held up his own piece of chalcedony.

  I grinned back at him. At first I had some doubts that Ty would want to time travel. I had only a glimpse of his life in the past, and he was far better off here in the future. In the past he was a slave to Seth’s family. Here, he was free.

  He must have seen the relief on my face as he set down the stone and joined me on the window seat.

  “What? Did you think I’d let you go off on adventures on your own? I promised Seth I’d take care of you, and you’re the best friend I’ve made in this time. I couldn’t let you run off alone. You have the power to direct travel, and I have the power to go with you,” Ty explained. “I think it works out perfectly.”

  “I know I can direct travel, but that’s the main problem. I have the ability, but I don’t know how,” I complained. At least he was on board with my plan to time travel again. Now I just needed to learn how.