Felicity smiles. "Good," she pronounces.
Felicity lowers her voice, leaning in toward you as she continues, "I know that my sister or Lianna might try to get you to join us here. It's your decision!" she says quickly, holding up her hand to block any objection that you might have had. "And for some people, it's the right decision. Gabriella's family cast her out, but she's happy here! And Lianna needed a refuge like this—truly needed it. But this isn't the right place for everyone. It's lonely here, with only the same few people every day. And…" She glances down at her planting, looking at her hands and not at you as she continues, "If you want to find love, or have children, you might not be able to do that here."
Her mouth twists with rueful irony. "With very few exceptions, people are going to be either much older or much younger than you. Besides my sister, everyone here is more than a decade younger than I am. Nick and I were both the same age when we arrived, but he was born twenty-two years after I was! There isn't any way I could have a relationship with someone that much younger—it just wouldn't feel right. How I wish I could move forward! You can learn here, and you can be safe, and you can grow in a great many ways. But…you would also be frozen. Like me."
That's the end of her lecture, it seems. She goes back to pulling weeds, and to small talk; asking more curious questions about the news and about the outside world.
But eventually, you have to say goodbye. No matter how it feels, this evening is going to end soon. And so will your break.
As you make your way back up the path through the woods, you sense the magic shifting around you. Like everything else to do with the Timeless Circle, now that you know what to look for, you can't not notice it.
And you remember what Josephine told you on your first visit: your magical ability means you're in a unique position to try to get closer to being Timeless. You could age a little less quickly; you could have that tranquility that Marcus and Janice and all the rest of the Circle have. But if you go too far, you'll need to stay in the Timeless Circle the way the others do. You wouldn't be trapped immediately, but over time, you'd need it more and more.
The magic is right there, waiting to be tapped. Do you want to try?