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Adam held it up to the light to admire its brassy gleam. There was no face behind the crystal but the gears inside it moved, winding around a shining green rock.

“What is this?”

“Static plane resonator.” Jack strapped one onto his wrist. “It’s designed to sync your aura to the school so that you won’t lose time no matter how far afield we go.”

“Sorry they don’t have a cuter name,” a voice said. “But I was outvoted.”

A girl who looked like she’d been head cheerleader stepped into the room. She was dressed in a pencil skirt, white leggings, and a soft pink sweater. She wore a pair of red opera-length gloves that clashed with her ensemble but matched her lipstick.

Jack beamed. “This is my girlfriend, Daffodil.”

She flashed him a bright white smile and waved.

“You can call me Daff.”

“You invented these?” He pointed to the watches as she reached for one.

“She did,” Jack said proudly.

Daff gave him a slight swat on the arm.

“Hex and Professor Lawless did most of the work. I just researched the chronological drift from the school’s temporal center.”

“I technically understand all of those words.” Adam stared at the device on his wrist. The little green rock pulsed like a thing alive.

“We used pieces of the school for the core,” Daff said. “Don’t worry, I don’t think it hurt.”

“And you’ve tested these?”

“Oh yes. Isaac has been wearing one in the field for a while. As long as you wear this we can get you back to where and when you should be. Just don’t eat or drink anything. We still haven’t solved that problem.”

“But you’re trying to?”

“Of course! Hex is using it for her senior project. If anyone can crack it, she can.”

Adam blinked. “How?”

“She’s trying to calculate a way to reverse the change in resonance. If it works, we’ll have a way to send the Lost Ones home, back to where and when they came from by tracking their initial resonance the same way we tracked the Archive key.”

She should be on Star Trek, Adam thought. That was some grade A techno-babble.

Adam remembered the fires stretching out past the gates of the Northern Watchtower.

“Any chance she could, uh, hurry?”

“She’s working on it! No one’s managed it before.”

“I’m not sure anyone has ever really tried,” Jack said with a frown.

Adam could imagine why. It was a problem that mostly affected mortals. Not enough elves left Alfheimr for it to be an issue. Vran had been an exception.

They seemed to follow his train of thought and for a moment, the three of them dimmed.

It was easy to forget that the sea elf had been a student at the school, and that they had lost him too.

“We miss him,” Daff said.

“Yeah.” Adam looked around, mostly to keep himself from tearing up at the sorrow on their faces. “Speaking of Isaac, I kind of thought he’d be here.”