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“Of course, Ma’am,” was all Leto said.

Taly didn’t look up as the door to her apartment closed.

Azura held up a plate. “Again.”

Slumping forward, Taly glared at her over the small dining table. “No, Az,” she pleaded, not caring that it came out as more of a whine. “Just… no. I’m done for today.”

After she had refused to come down to dinner, the Queen had come to her—along with Leto and a formal seven-course meal that could have easily fed ten people.

Or rather, should have. Taly stared at the empty salad bowl, wondering if it would be bad form to lick the dressing out of the bottom. The bowl was accompanied by many other empty dishes and platters, but she had difficulty feeling any embarrassment.

She had once watched Skye devour two whole casseroles, a plate of eggs, several loaves of bread, and an entire tin of ice cream after a particularly brutal day of training. Granted, he had been young and still growing into his long legs and gangly body, but it hadn’t stopped her from teasing him. Mercilessly.

That memory made her sad now. If she had it to do over, she might not tease him quite so much. Not when she finally understood that gnawing hunger, the need to be full, if only because she instinctively knew that the more she ate, the quicker the burning sensation in her lungs, the weakness in her limbs, would finally begin to fade.What had once seemed so alien to her was now a way of life.

In short, she was beginning to realize what it meant to be fey, and it was still awful. Eating never used to be such a chore.

Leto removed her empty plate, replacing it with another filled with chicken and potatoes and some sort of sausage mixture that Khanna—the fairy that ruled over the kitchen with an iron spatula—claimed was an old family recipe. Wasting no time, Taly dug in, ignoring the sigh of exasperation from across the table.

“Your manners are atrocious,” Azura commented.

“I’m hungry,” Taly said around a mouthful of food. “And injured, and tired, and…” The Queen looked unmoved. “Shut up. You’re the one that didn’t listen to me when I said my aether was depleted.”

“Your aether wasn’t depleted.” Azura finally set down the plate, and Taly let out a sigh of relief. “You merely thought it was.”

“I couldn’t move, and it felt like someone had set my lungs on fire.” Taly took another bite of chicken. “That’s textbook aether depletion.”

“My dear, considering your pedigree, you should’ve had enough aether to cast three times as many spells as I saw you throw around today. You could go for days without ever needing to stop if you just learned to stop wasting so much magic. Which is why—”

Azura picked up the plate once more and this time let it drop from her fingers. The porcelain shattered as it hit the marble, and Calcifer, who had been sniffing around beneath the table, scattered. “Again.”

Grumbling out a curse, Taly set down her fork and held out a hand, wincing at the pain the movement elicited. She tapped that well of power and felt it instantly recoil, like a wounded animal.

Just a little more,she begged, but it was like trying to squeeze water from stone.

So, she gripped it.

And pulled.

And dragged.

Until finally, golden pinpricks of light sparked around her fingers. Until every breath felt like fire, and that ache that had settled so deep and so fierce began to blaze and twist and scream.

But then she felt the spell catch. She heard the porcelain clink as the fragments were pulled through the air by an unseen hand and carefully knitted back together. The cracks blurred and faded, and the plate continued to rise, until it finally reappeared over the edge of the table and placed itself back into the Queen’s waiting hand, whole and unmarred.

Taly gasped for air, reaching for her glass of wine. She was surprised the syrupy sweet liquid didn’t turn to steam when it hit the column of fire that had ignited in her throat. Draining the glass in a few gulps, she barely tasted the alcohol.

Taly slammed the glass back down on the table, barely managing to choke out, “Why is going backward in time so much harder than going forward?”

Azura eyed the plate in her hand. “The future has a certain momentum. It twists and turns with every decision that gets made, but it’s moving inexorablyforward. If you can see the variables, then you merely need to nudge the timeline one way or the other.

“But the past…” She waggled the plate for emphasis. “The past is rigid. It has a set path, and though the more powerful members of our order can pull elements from unrealized timelines and blend them into the Weave, perhaps even travel physically through time and try to push a set of events in a different direction, that’s not something I would recommend doing.”

“You’re talking about changing the past,” Taly said, picking up her fork and diving back into her food.

“Yes,” Azura said with a nod. She placed the plate back on the table. “Changes are cumulative. A hundred years from now, something as inconsequential as fixing a previously broken plate can spiral into chaos. Which is why we, as time mages, must strike a delicate balance. Part of our ability to do what we do stems from our magic’s inherent ability to stabilize these changes, to keep them from rippling out through time and having untoward effects.”

Taly eyed the plate. “So how do you know which future is best then? How do you make sure all the right plates get broken?”