Complications

Complications
Maya's POV
"Family?" I whispered, my heart stopping completely. "What do you mean, family?"
The old witch smiled like she'd just won the biggest prize in the world. "Oh, Maya, didn't you ever wonder why your magic was so powerful? Why you could make time portals without any training? Why Damien's presence made your powers explode?"
I looked at Damien, and he looked just as shocked as I felt. His face had gone completely white.
"You're lying," I said, but my voice shook. "That's impossible."
"Is it? Maya, think about it. What's your last name?"
"Chen," I said immediately.
"Your adopted name, dear child. The name your adopted parents gave you after your real parents died in that car crash when you were three. But do you remember what your birth certificate said before it was changed?"
My blood turned to ice. I'd never thought about my original name. My foster parents had told me my birth parents died when I was too young to remember, and I'd never wanted to dig up painful memories.
"I don't—"
"Blackthorne," the witch said softly. "Your real name was Maya Blackthorne."
Damien made a choking sound. "That's my family name."
"Exactly!" The witch clapped her hands together like we were playing some fun game instead of having our entire world turned upside down. "Damien, your bloodline doesn't end with you. You have a younger brother back in your time, don't you? Thomas?"
Damien nodded slowly, like he was in a dream.
"Well, Thomas survives the fight. He gets married, has children, and the Blackthorne family continues for five hundred years until Maya is born. She's your straight descendant, carrying the same magical blood that made you such a powerful warrior."
"No," I said, backing away from both of them. "No, that's awful. We can't be related. We're in love!"
"Oh, but you are related. Very distantly, of course. By Maya's time, you'd be what... her great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather? Maybe one or two more greats in there. The family tree gets a bit twisted after five centuries. "
I felt sick. Actually, bodily sick. The room was spinning, and I couldn't catch my breath.
"Maya, calm down," Damien said, reaching for me. "It doesn't matter—"
"It doesn't matter?" I screamed. "Damien, we're related! This is like some horrible fairy tale gone wrong!"
"But you love him," the witch said sweetly. "And he loves you. That hasn't changed."
"Everything has changed!" I could feel my magic sparking around me, making the air smell like lightning. "This is why our magic works so well together, isn't it? Because we have the same special blood?"
"Partly, yes. But also because you were always meant to find each other. Maya, do you want to know the real reason Marcus sent Damien through time?"
"Stop talking!" I yelled. "I don't want to know anything else!"
But the witch kept going anyway. "Marcus didn't send Damien to the future to get him out of the way. He sent Damien to find you. Marcus has been trying to get his hands on a Blackthorne relative for years, because your family's magic is the only thing powerful enough to help him conquer time itself."
My knees gave out, and I sank to the floor. "What?"
"Oh yes, dear. You've been playing right into Marcus's hands this whole time. He needed Damien to awaken your powers, and he needed your powers to be strong enough to make stable time portals. Maya, every time you've used magic to help Damien, you've been making it easier for Marcus to move through time."
Elena, who had been quiet this whole time, suddenly gasped. "Maya, the spell I've been teaching you to send Damien home—"
"Will open a permanent doorway between past and present," the witch finished. "Marcus will be able to move his entire army through time. He'll win not just one kingdom, but every kingdom, in every time period, forever."
I felt like I was drowning. "But we have to send Damien home. The link closes tomorrow night!"
"Actually," the witch said, checking something that looked like a pocket watch, "it closes in about three hours. And Maya, there's one more tiny detail I forgot to say."
"What?" Damien and I said at the same time.
The witch's smile turned absolutely evil. "If you don't send Damien back tonight, he'll die. The magic that brought him here is already disappearing. His body can't live in your time much longer. But if you do send him back, you'll be giving Marcus exactly what he wants."
I stared at her in horror. "So either Damien dies, or we help an evil sorcerer take over all of history?"
"Pretty much, yes. Oh, and Maya? There's one more difficulty."
"I can't handle any more complications," I whispered.
"Well, this one's rather important. You see, the spell to send Damien home needs the blood of both a past Blackthorne and a present Blackthorne. Which means you have to go with him."
"What do you mean, go with him?"
"I mean permanently. Maya, once you go back to the past with Damien, you can never return to your own time. The magic will bind you to his age forever."
The room went totally silent except for the sound of my heart beating so hard I thought it might explode.
"So let me get this straight," I said slowly. "We're related, Marcus has been using us this whole time, sending Damien home will help Marcus conquer history, but if we don't send him home in three hours he'll die, and the only way to save him is for me to give up my entire life and go back to medieval times forever?"
"That's a very good summary, dear."
I looked at Damien, who looked like he wanted to punch something. Then I looked at Elena, who was furiously flipping through her spell book like she was looking for some other answer.
And that's when I heard it.
Footsteps.
Heavy sounds coming from somewhere above us, like someone was walking around on the library's roof.
But that was impossible. We were on the third floor, and there was nothing above us except— CRASH.
The ceiling burst, and Marcus dropped through it in a shower of plaster and broken wood, landing right in the middle of our group with a smile that made the witch's evil grin look friendly.
"Hello, children," he said, brushing dust off his black clothes. "Did I miss anything important?"