“Only if you ask. Then it comes alive. But if you ask it, it’ll do stuff. Like spy under doorways. Lead you somewhere.”

“But how do I ask it, Colin?” Isaac stopped in his tracks. “I don’t talk to animals.”

“It’ll listen. Trust me.”

Isaac exchanged a look with a wide-eyed Amelie.

“Just don’t bring it into my room,” she said. “I only picked it up to bring it to you because I saw the pattern.” She shuddered. “I really hate snakes.”

“Do not worry,” Isaac said. “I’ll put the pack in my room.”

“It’s almost time for supper,” Colin said. “I’m famished. How about you, Canut?”

The dog gave a happy grumble and they moved off together.

“And we’d better find out what Baines has been up to in our absence,” Kat said with a sigh. “Leo, do you mind?”

Leo shrugged and gave a little smile. “I’ll go check.”

“Kat,” Isaac said. “What more can you tell me about time travel?” Ame paused and turned to listen.

“Time travel,” Kat echoed. “Well. Scientifically speaking, time travel disrupts the space-time continuum.”

“The what?” Isaac asked.

“Space-time continuum. Albert Einstein has written about it. How space and time are related, how they work together. It’s physics.” She paused, tapping her lips with her index finger. “I’ll read up on it some more.”

“All right,” he said, still pondering. “So, is time travel science? Or is it magic?”

“Great question.” Kat looked away into the distance. “Until something can be explained logically by science, maybe we call it magic. I think magic has substance. I think it sticks, rather like lint. But it’s invisible. If we could see it, we’d probably give it a different name, like science. I think magic has stuck to Rookskill Castle for thousands and thousands of years, for as long as people have been in this place.”

Isaac wondered whether magic was sticking to him. Magic from his parents. Maybe that explained his so-called gift. “My parents said they are locked in a time stream. What is that?”

Kat shook her head. “Not sure. But I can find out. I’m guessing they aren’t in any specific time or place. But how they got there, I don’t know. Sorry.” She paused. “You do know about the law of unintended consequences, right?”

“Um . . .”

“If you change something in the past, you can change the future. You could change everything. Like a little ripple effect that can grow.”

“I know about that.” Isaac bit his lip, thinking about Hypatia, and his father’s admonition to not, for any reason, interact with the past.

Kat nodded. “Good. Next, we need to figure out your magical gift, Isaac.”

“Right,” he said.

Kat moved off and Isaac turned to Amelie. He asked her, “How would you like to time travel with me?”

CHAPTER 28

Ralph Baines

1942