The Book of Time

Chapter 19

"Junaid," Zahir said when they reached. Yavar was standing next to them.

"What happened? All Shay told us was that it started to snow in your office," Thomas said.

"She overdosed herself on these," Yavar said. He tossed a red bottle to Thomas. "You should have known better than to give her those."

"I didn't give her anything," Thomas said. "She took what she needed to get rid of the pain. That is something I know." Luca patted his back. He moved towards the door. Zahir grabbed his arm.

"She'll be out soon. No need to go in there. You remember what happened last time," he said.

"I do." Thomas opened the door. Shay was lying on the bench. She sat up when she heard him enter.

"What are you doing in here?" she asked. "I'm fine. You can leave."

He knelt on one knee so that they were eyelevel. "I had to make sure for myself." The heat was starting to make him feel dizzy. He rested his left hand on her cheek. "How is it that you're still cold in this heat?"

"I don't know but you should leave now before you overheat." Her eyes were drooping and her skin was pale. Her lips looked a little blue.

He nodded and stood. He helped her lie back down. "I'll talk to Yavar. He might tell me something since Zahir's around. I'll come back in to check on you soon."

Thomas didn't breathe properly until he was back outside. He was blasted with water.

Luca dropped the hose. "Sorry," he said.

Thomas shook his head and dried himself. "Yavar, you need to do something," he said.

"I'm not--" Yavar started.

"Yavar, we can't let the girl die, for his sake and ours," Zahir said. "And she needs to be functioning to give us more information."

Yavar threw up his hands and walked away.

"Did you finish talking?" Thomas asked.

"No. We still have more things to discus but I do have an idea when Samuel will come here. He won't destroy this house as well. We didn't get to talk about the book," Zahir said. He looked back at the sauna. "I won't get anything out of her for a while." He limped back to the house. He paused. "And don't think I don't know what you were trying to do. There's a reason I gave you that card."

"He got the bills sent to his phone," Luca said, looking a little scared. While he'd never been on the receiving end of his anger, everyone knew that it was foolish to make Zahir angry.

"Relax. If he was going to get angry, he would already be angry and I was the one who spent the money, not you." Thomas leaned against the wall of the sauna. "You can go take a nap. You look at little tired."

Luca stretched. "Yeah. A nap sounds good right about now. I'll see you later."

When Luca was inside, Thomas called Shay from his bracelet. "Are you alright in there?" he asked.

"I stopped shivering," Shay said. "Did everyone else leave?"

"Yes. It's just you and me here now."

"Oh."

"Something on your mind?" he asked.

She didn't say anything for a bit. "I... saw something strange and I wanted to ask you about it," she said.

His heart stopped beating. "What did you see?" he asked.

"It was you, well, I think it was you. The boy must have been around four years old. He went into a bedroom and there was a woman sitting in the chair. He tried to wake her up but she didn't move and she fell out. That was it. I couldn't understand what he was saying."