I lay there, watching the people above me zoom about as if I’d put time on fast forward. And then abruptly freeze, dead still, with the rabbit/goat thing stuck halfway through an arc in the air above me. I’d almost forgotten about him, despite the fact that he’d been the whole point of our trip, but it looked like I’d successfully brought him back, too.

And he was pissed about it.

Or maybe that was because someone had thrown him, although I couldn’t see who. I couldn’t see much of anything, since I could no longer turn my head or even blink my eyes. It felt like somebody had stopped time, although I didn’t think that was what was happening here. I could pull out of a time stoppage, even one thrown by another Pythia. But this…

I didn’t know this.

The rabbit/goat was looking a little worse for the wear, I noticed, with his coat torn and his pantaloons splattered with blood. It didn’t look like the blood was his, since more deep crimson was dripping off of the seriously elongated fangs in the snarling little maw. But the golden eyes had a contrasting expression, and the square pupils stared bewilderedly into mine, as if asking “do you know what the hell?”

I stared mutely back.

I did not know what the hell.

Time abruptly snapped back to normal, the rabbit/goat sailed off and hit the floor, and then scrambled up and ran in a panic for the door. Mircea and Pritkin raced after him, with Pritkin pausing long enough to look at me oddly. “Are you—”

“Go,” Hilde barked, kneeling by my side.

Pritkin’s green eyes continued to look at me, because he did not take orders from Hilde. Of course, he didn’t take them from me all that often, either, but this was one of the rare exceptions. I managed a slight nod and off he went.

“What is it?” Marco asked, kneeling on my other side.

And continuing to do so, in a stuttering motion that made me want to close my eyes or look away, but it was almost impossible to do either. Damn it! What the hell was wrong with me?

“Ph-ph-ph-ph-ph-ph-phasing,” Hilde said, and then time normalized again and she snapped her fingers at someone behind me. “My case. In the corner of my etagere—”

“I know it.” I heard the breathless voice of my heir, Rhea, and then her running footsteps. Out of my room and down the hall she flew, almost noiseless on the subtle beige carpeting. She could have just shifted, but Rhea was kind of new to all this.

I could sympathize.

“Yeah, heard you the first time,” Marco was saying. “Doesn’t tell me much.”

“She’s stuck in transition,” Hilde said. “The shift did not complete, leaving her simultaneously occupying numerous times, all at once.”