All his pages were glued shut. I tried to stretch my mental grasp, but Nagi’s timeghost started fading, so I latched on before I lost everything. The lines of their shoulders were almost solid with certainty, but the closer it came to happening in the present, the harder it was to hold. I squinted so deep my face pinched, giving everything I had to keep watching.

I had to get every drop of information I could.

He and Nagi shake hands as a door opens. “Wait outside, Altair. I’ll make your formal introduction.”

He nods. “Thank you, sir. I’m thrilled to have this opportunity.”

So they were working together.

Damn it. The future only solidified right before it happened. I needed to know these things more than two seconds in advance or I couldn’t plan a strategy.

Now it was too late to plan.

My door slid open.

Doctor Tenma Nagi strode in wearing a cold smile. “Quanta. How did you enjoy house arrest?”

I managed not to tremble, but I wanted to. He still looked exactly the same after ten or however many years—hair smoothed back, dark eyes boring into me like cranial drills, and not a day older. It wasn’t the agelessness or how he looked that creeped me out. More his overwhelming aura of power. He could do anything he wanted to me or anyone else.

No one would question him. No one ever questioned him.

To keep from having to stare, I grabbed a charcoal pencil from the coffee table and moved to the wall. I’d started drawing a mural-sized elephant this morning and now was the time to get back to work.

“It’s been really restful.” Just taking the charcoal stick in my hand made it easier to breathe. I can do this. “So nice to have a break from my busy schedule.”

Nagi’s soft chuckle lifted the hairs on the back of my neck. “I’m sure.”

I concentrated on shading the elephant’s flank. Nagi would get to what he wanted eventually. Grasping for the future still left me with nothing, but he obviously hadn’t dropped in to braid my hair.

“Altair Orpheus,” Nagi said. “Are you familiar with the name?”

I kept moving the pencil, playing casual. Not playing, actually. I’d only heard the guy’s name a few seconds ago, so it wasn’t like I really knew him. “Should I be?”

“Haven’t you seen what’s coming?”

My hand jerked and a thick black line appeared on the elephant’s leg. What was that supposed to mean?

I reached out with my mind, searching for the glowing edges of the future. The past opened if I cared, but anything after this moment…

I braced a hand against the wall as a wave of dizziness almost toppled me. It can’t be the end. Blank didn’t necessarily mean death.