Page 9 of The Ember and the Emerald

Mom reached for the dish her friend had pulled from the oven, intending to lift it.

“Oh, no, you don’t.” My father hurried over. He picked up the platter, hissed at the heat, then donned mitts and tried again. He set it on the table.

My mom waddled behind him. “Emma traveled with me through the waterway,” she said, easing into the seat next to my dad’s while making an adorable, scrunchy face.

Waterway, waterway. Earlier, she’d said, You sent me through a door between worlds.

Were they one and the same?

“She’ll help me return to Hakeldama after the baby is born,” Mom added.

Uh… Should I tell her she stays here to raise her daughter?

Nope, no upsetting her. Lips zipped.

The indomitable Daniel Shaker placed the remaining dishes on the table and reclaimed his spot. “So what’s your story, Rye?”

A note of suspicion buzzed in his voice. I could lie, but that would only create distrust between us. Besides, we both prized honesty. It was a necessity for any successful relationship.

“It’s confusing,” I warned, deciding to omit the most upsetting details.

“Tell us anyway.”

Here goes. “I’m a time-traveler from the future. That’s why the timeline is off.” Both parents frowned. After that, words spewed out lightning fast. “I was born here. In Ozworld, Kansas. Twenty years from now, I will travel to Hakeldama via a tornado. For me, that’s already happened. Yesterday, I returned here, to Ozworld, via another tornado. But I arrived before my birth.” A big hint. Would Mom catch it? “From what I’ve pieced together, I’ll return to Hakeldama and meet you in your past.”

Silence held the entire room in a vise.

“See. Confusing,” I grumbled. “I’m still trying to make sense of it.”

She blinked rapidly while my dad leaned back in his chair and stroked his chin.

“There’s a legend in my husband’s family about time loops producing many versions of the same royal, and one defeating the big, bad,” Mom said. “But I never thought…had just assumed…”

Time loops? Instantly snared, I beseeched, “Please tell me everything.” Like, there were other versions of me running around?

“I remember…” she rubbed her temples. “A water maiden is involved. Yes! And a spark.”

So Ian hadn’t chosen the time of my landing; a water maiden had? But which one? This Elowen? Iris? And what that mean, a spark?

Mom pursed her lips. “Excuse me. I’ll be right back.” She stood and shuffled from the room, leaving me alone with a man who didn’t know who I was to him, either, and it killed me a little inside.

At some point in the future, he would absolutely realize the daughter he raised as his own resembled the oracle who’d once sat in his kitchen, claiming to be from the future. We even bore the same name.

And yet, later, when I was older, he would choose not to tell me. Why?

“If you’re here to hurt her, you will regret it,” he said, his cold, harsh tone a shock.

“I will never hurt her,” I promised, meaning it. “I love her. You love her too, and soon, the two of you will marry.” Screw keeping secrets with him. “You’ll help raise her baby. A daughter you’ll name Moriah,” I flattened my hands on the table and stared at him, stern. “Stop smoking. Like, immediately. And do not, under any circumstances, start again. If you do, you’ll develop lung cancer and devastate your sweet Rye.”

His eyes narrowed as they searched mine, but he gave no other reaction, leaving his thoughts shrouded. “Anything else I should know?”

“In eight years,” I said, white-knuckling the table’s edge, “your beloved Sandy will–”

“Found it,” my mother called, cutting off my warning about the terrible day we returned to an empty house and found her blood splattered on the walls.

I wanted to tell her, too, but this still wasn’t the moment for a big confession. The woman struggled to lower herself into the chair. Stress her more than she could handle? No.

I’d get my dad alone and make him believe me. Together, we could plan the best way to approach her.