Kneeling in the sand, Jake flipped over the cell phone, saw that the battery was still in place. Hopefully there was enough charge to make one call.

He snapped the farspeaker crystal against the battery pack, held his breath, and flipped open the phone. Again a glowing picture of Kady’s cheerleading squad appeared. Kady stood at the center, holding her sword aloft, defiant and bold. He flashed to his sister as she stood frozen forever in gray stone. As if caught by that same spell, he couldn’t move, couldn’t take his eyes off the photo.

Then the phone vibrated and a weak voice whispered up at him. “Jacob … Jacob, is that you?”

He snapped back to the moment and raised the phone to his ear, ducking lower. The others all leaned their heads closer, listening in.

“Magister Balam, it’s me.” Marika’s father must have been glued to his farspeaker after the last call had been interrupted. “We’re in trouble. We’ve reached the storm barrier around Ankh Tawy, but creatures of the Skull King have us trapped. We don’t know what to do.”

There followed a long pause. Jake couldn’t blame Marika’s father. It was a lot to digest at once.

“Magister Balam …”

“Yes, Jacob … a moment.”

Jake peered between bodies. The Skull King, wearing Kree’s body, crouched with the grakyl witch. Jake didn’t know if he even had a moment. It looked as if Kalverum Rex was preparing to move through the storm. Straining with his ears, Jake heard Balam talking to someone in the background—then he was back.

“After we spoke last, Magister Zahur has been sifting through the legends of Ankh Tawy. He found one scroll, as old as his tribe. It spoke of the storm, supposedly written by one of the ancient Magisters of that lost city, a fellow named Oolof. The writer had clearly gone mad, but he was firm on one point.”

“What’s that?”

“The storm you speak of … it’s not a storm, but something unnatural.”

That was not news to Jake. He glanced at the bolts of lightning shooting through the howling winds.

“At its heart,” Balam continued, “the barrier is not a storm but a river.”

Jake frowned. “A river?”

“That’s right. A river of time, a torrent of past, present, and future all muddled together, sweeping around and around that cursed land.”

Jake considered the Magister’s words, sensing the strange truth to them. It always came back to time. He remembered Kady using the exact same words. Time is fluid, like a river.

Balam explained more. “Anyone from this period of time—from the present age—who tries to enter that storm will be shredded out of existence. But there is a key—”

Jake closed his eyes, despondent. “The Key of Time. I know. My father’s pocket watch.”

“What? No. According to the ancient text, the key is nothing one can build or construct.”

Jake opened his eyes, surprised. “Then what is it?”

A crackle of static ate away the last of the Magister’s words. The battery was running low, the connection weakening.