“There are worse things than being hurt.” And I bet you know all of them, I thought, wishing I had Barnabas and Nakita to back me. Jeez, it was weird having them silent and unmoving behind me. With a sudden thought, I brought up the nether sight of my mind, searching the fabric of time for the violet glow of Nakita and the brilliant green of Barnabas. Finding them, I wiped all the threads that were connecting them to Ron’s amulet.

Feeling it, Ron swore, dropping back as Barnabas and Nakita both came to life.

A surge of excitement washed through me, and I wavered on my feet with the effort of trying to divide my attention between the now and the next. The minute I quit wiping Ron’s amulet’s threads, they would be frozen again.

“Leave her alone, Ron!” Barnabas shouted as he caught me, and I felt an odd sensation tingle through my aura.

Nakita stood between us, and I wanted to cry. I had freed them! I wasn’t so helpless after all, even if Barnabas was keeping me from falling down.

“It’s not me,” Ron said darkly. “She’s just not good at what she’s trying to do.” Barnabas’s grip on me tightened, and I slowly found my balance. “’S okay,” I said softly as dividing my thoughts got easier. I had practiced wiping threads before, but I hadn’t done it in a while. Even so, that time I had been destroying the threads my amulet was making, not another’s. This was…hard, and I couldn’t concentrate on everything.

Nakita slowly eased out of her instinctive crouch, knowing Ron wasn’t bent on hurting us. He just wanted to know what we were doing. I wasn’t going to tell him, and he looked unhappy as I slowly stood under my own power. All we’d have to do was leave, and he’d get nothing.

“What do you want?” I said, though it was obvious. And who was that with you in the desert? Finding enough time to teach him, are you?

Ron spread his hands wide as he tried to look reasonable. “To know what you’re doing,” he said. “It’s not a scything, or I would have flashed forward by now.”

Nakita shifted to put her slight form between me and Ron. “So you can just go, yes?” she said, but he ignored her, looking at Barnabas instead.

“Killing those you once pledged to me to save,” Ron said caustically, and I realized that the two hadn’t spoken since I’d become the dark timekeeper and Barnabas had left him. “I gave you your amulet. You were my best, Barnabas, but I wouldn’t take you back now if you abased yourself on a rock for a thousand years. Consorting with the same dark reaper you fought against? Look at her, with her black nails and shiny purse. She’s no warrior. You’ve yoked yourself to the inept and foolish. You have truly fallen, angel.”