«More! More!» demanded Kirielle.
«Oh come on, Kiri,» sighed Zorian. He really wasn’t in the mood for her antics at the moment. «I indulged you, didn’t I? Go find something else to amuse yourself now.»
She pouted at him, but he was thoroughly immune to such things by now. Then she frowned for a moment and suddenly straightened as if remembering something.
Wait…
«No!» Zorian shouted, but he was already too late. Kiri already ran into the bathroom and slammed the door behind her. «Damn it, Kiri, why now? Why not before I woke up?»
«Sucks to be you,» she answered.
Zorian leaned forward until his forehead collided with the door. «I had forewarning and I still fell for it.»
He frowned. Forewarning, indeed. Whatever his ‘future memories’ were, they seemed to be fairly reliable. Was Cyoria really going to get invaded during the summer festival, then? What should he do about that? What could he do about that? He shook his head and marched back to his room. He would not even contemplate that sort of question until he found out more about what had happened to him. He locked the door so he would have some privacy and sat on his bed. He needed to think.
Okay. So he lived through a whole month of school before… something happened… and then he woke up in his room back in Cirin, as if the entire month never happened. Even with magic factored in, that was preposterous. Time travel was impossible. He didn’t have any books in his room that discussed the topic at any appreciable length, but all of the passages that dealt with time travel agreed that it couldn’t be done. Even dimensional magic could only warp time, speeding it up or slowing it. It was one of the few things mages agreed was beyond the ability of magic to accomplish.
So how, then, was he living through it?
He was just in the process of consulting the books in his room for any type of magic that could ‘fake’ time travel in some way when a knock on his door interrupted his thoughts, and he suddenly realized he was still in his pajamas and that mother wanted to talk to him quite a while ago. He quickly changed and opened the door, only to find himself under the scrutiny of two women, only one of which was his mother.
He almost greeted Ilsa by name, but he caught himself in time.
«A teacher from the academy has come to talk to you,» his mother said, her disapproving stare telling him she was going to give him an earful once Ilsa left.
«Greetings,» Ilsa said. «I am Ilsa Zileti, from Cyoria’s Royal Academy of Magical Arts. I was hoping to speak to you about some matters before you leave. It won’t take long.»
«Of course,» said Zorian. «Um, where do you…»
«Your room shall suffice,» Ilsa said.
«I’ll bring you something to drink,» his mother said, excusing herself.
Zorian watched Ilsa as she unpacked various papers and placed them on his desk (what was she doing with those, anyway?), trying to decide how to proceed with this. If his future memories were valid, she should be handing him the scroll right about…
Yeah, there it is. Knowing what’s going to happen in advance is weird.
For the sake of appearances Zorian gave the scroll a cursory examination before channeling mana into it. It was exactly how he remembered it — the calligraphy, the flowery official-sounding phrases, the elaborate crest at the bottom of the document — and Zorian felt a wave of dread wash over him. What the hell had he gotten himself involved in? He had no idea what was happening to him, but it was big. Very big.
He had the urge to tell Ilsa about his predicament and seek her advice, but he restrained himself. It sounded like the most sensible thing to do — surely a fully trained mage like her was far more qualified for tackling this than he was — but what could he possibly tell her? That he was remembering things that hadn’t happened yet? Yeah, that would go over well. Besides, considering the nature of his future memories, he could easily see himself arrested if a conspiracy to invade Cyoria was really discovered thanks to his warnings. After all, it’s far more likely his shocking knowledge comes from being a defector of the conspiracy than him being some kind of weird time traveler. An image of a couple of government agents torturing him for information briefly flittered through his mind and he shuddered.
No, best to keep all this to himself for now.
So for the next 10 minutes, Zorian basically reenacted his memories of his initial interaction with Ilsa, not seeing the point in choosing differently this time — all of his choices were made for reasons that were currently every bit as valid as they were in his future memories. He didn’t argue with Ilsa about Xvim this time around, though, since he already knew arguing over that topic was pointless, and he didn’t request a bathroom break, since he already knew what electives he wished to take. Ilsa seemed completely indifferent to his strange decisiveness, apparently just as eager as he was to get this whole thing out of the way. Then again, why would she be surprised at his decisiveness? She had no future memories to compare this entire encounter to, unlike him. Hell, she didn’t even know him up until now.
Zorian sighed and shook his head. They really did feel just like normal memories, and it was hard to ignore them. This is going to be a one long month.
«Are you alright, Mr. Kazinski?»
Zorian glanced at Ilsa curiously, trying to divine why she asked him that. She glanced towards his hands — only for a moment, but Zorian caught it. His hands were shaking. He balled them into fists and took a deep breath.
«I’m fine,» he said. A second or so of uncomfortable silence ensued, Ilsa apparently unwilling to continue with her closing speech while she continued to study him. «Can I ask you a question?»
«Of course,» Ilsa said. «That’s why I’m here.»
«What do you think about time travel?»
She was clearly taken aback by the question — it was probably the last thing she expected him to ask, or at least close to the bottom of the list. She composed herself very quickly though.
«Time travel is impossible,» Ilsa said firmly. «Time can only be dilated or compressed. Never skipped or reversed.»
«Why?» asked Zorian, honestly curious. He had never actually seen an explanation for the impossibility of time travel, though that might be because he wasn’t terribly interested in the topic up until now.
Ilsa sighed. «I admit I’m not particularly knowledgeable about the details, but our best theories indicate that going against temporal currents is utterly impossible. As in ‘draw a square circle’ impossible, not ‘leap over the ocean’ impossible. The river of time flows only in one direction. Beyond that, innumerable attempts have been made in recorded past, all ending in failure.» She gave him a sharp look. «I sincerely hope you won’t waste your talents on such a fool’s quest.»
«I was just curious,» Zorian said defensively. «I was just reading a chapter discussing limitations of magic and wondered why the author was so certain time travel is impossible.»
«Well now you know,» Ilsa said, getting up. «Now if that’s all, I really should be going. I’ll be happy to answer any further questions on Monday after class. Have a nice day.»
Zorian watched her leave and shut the door behind her before collapsing back on his bed. Definitely a long month.