Rayna's eyes widened as she saw it too - a barely perceptible distortion, like heat waves rising from hot pavement. "An anomaly," she breathed. "They're getting closer."
As they watched, the shimmer grew more pronounced. For a split second, Brianna thought she saw a face pushing through, its features twisted in a malevolent grin, before it vanished.
Brianna felt her heart racing as she stared at the spot where the face had appeared. "We need to get out of here. Now."
Rayna nodded, her expression grim. "Grab the Codex. I'll cover our escape."
With trembling hands, Brianna reached for the shimmering book. As her fingers touched its surface, she felt a jolt of energy course through her body. The Codex solidified in her grasp, its cover warm and pulsing with barely contained power.
Just as Brianna secured the Codex, a loud crack echoed through the library. The anomaly was expanding, the air around it warped and twisted unnaturally.
"Run!" Rayna shouted. All pretense of stealth abandoned. She raised her hands, muttering a quick incantation that sent a burst of protective energy towards the anomaly, only instead of protecting them, Rayna’s burst of energy ripped a hole in the fabric, allowing someone’s arm to penetrate the Aether and reach into the Library of Congress. “Shit!”
Brianna swiveled to see what had happened. She clutched the Codex Temporis tightly to her chest as she and Rayna sprinted through the darkened library. Behind them, she could hear someone grunting, like the sound of something forcing its way through the expanding anomaly.
"We need to seal it!" Brianna shouted as they ran.
Rayna nodded grimly. "Once we're clear of the building. We can't risk trapping ourselves in here with whatever's coming through!"
They burst out of the library's side entrance, the cool night air a stark contrast to the stifling atmosphere inside. Rayna whirled around, her hands glowing with magical energy as she began to chant a sealing spell.
But it was too late.
A female figure emerged from the rip, her form flickering and distorting as if she had not fully materialized in this reality.
“What now?” Brianna cried.
Rayna worried her lip. “I’m out of ideas. What have you got?”
“Time manipulation? We can go back to before you threw your energy grenade…”
“My— Never mind, just do it!”
Brianna grabbed Rayna’s wrist and yanked her back inside the library. She closed her eyes and concentrated hard on the moment she’d grabbed the codex and felt it solidify in her hands. A moment later, they were back in the magical archives, with Brianna holding the codex. “Now we run and don’t look back.”
Rayna didn’t need to be told twice. She ran behind Brianna, just as she had before, but this time she waited until they were out of the library before she whirled toward the anomaly and uttered her sealing spell. Then she slammed the door shut.
“How do we know if it worked?” Brianna asked.
Rayna leaned over, hands on her knees, as she panted. “We don’t, but I’m going to pretend it did.”
“Pretend?”
“Okay, I used the wrong word. Believe. You need to believe in your magic for it to work.”
“Yeah. I get that. But now we should probably get our butts back to the mansion. Will the Codex be safe there?”
“Oh, yes. Duke has a couple of sections of the L.A.W.’s occult library cloaked and warded. No one knows where those are, except for one other person.”
“Bas, I’d guess.”
“Nope. It’s someone he knows who we’re not aware of. The less any of us knows, the safer we’ll all be.”
“I get it. Nobody to torture the information out of.”
“Exactly.”
20
