"Do you want to see my index of loops and quiz me on their contents or something?"

 "...You know what, it's probably faster to do this. Kaff? Can you do non-invasive lie detection? No peeking at anyone's thoughts, just, magically judging whether an utterance is true."

"No. No wishing for information."

"Right. What about - Don't do this yet, not until I'm sure I want it, but could you give me the ability to do lie detection like that? Add it to the magic I can do."

"...I can do that. I never thought of that. I can give Spirit Bearers new spells. I would want forty hours of work equivalent as a favor."

Tara gives a nervous little chuckle. "It's been done before with other genies.. Uh, I should specify how it should work. Deliberate activation on things currently being spoken or signed. Ends when I stop focusing on activating it on a single person. I should get the feedback the same way as my other sensory powers. Can you give me degrees of truthfulness? 'This is mostly true' if something is left out, or 'this is mostly false but based on something true'. So it's not a binary total truth or total lie."

"No. Only true or false. I would need to understand humans very well to do what you ask."

"How much of my own magic would it require?"

"I don't know. Not excessive amounts."

"Would it work on writing? Through phones?"

"Only if you watch things being written. No."

"Hmm. Bella, uh, I would be well satisfied by getting this lie detection and asking you to verify what you've told me. So, do you see any flaws in this idea?"

"If it just does true or false that seems sufficiently noninvasive to me. You're betting that if I were malicious I couldn't beat it with my own magic, though."

"If there's anything interfering with or blocking the scan, I get no result. And I find that an acceptably low risk."

"Okay. If you want to work forty hours for a cut rate lie detecting power."

"Well, it's going to be very, very useful for trust and cooperation in the short term and probably reasonably useful in the long term besides. And it's not like I don't have the time once I get home - we only age if we want to."

"Us too. Okay."

"And it's not that I dislike you, or that I'm particularly mistrustful. More like, when the phrase 'the end of the world' starts getting said, you have to be sure of things if it's at all practical. Kaff, do it as specified, please."

The dusty figure reaches toward Tara and touches her outstretched hand. There's a rushing sound.

Tara looks at Bella, eyes slightly glowing, and asks, "Say something true and something false?"

"My name is Bella. - er, that's a nickname, I dunno how sensitive your spell is -"

"That parsed as false. So I'll have to be very literal using this."

"My name is Isabella? My name is Isabella Marie Swan?"

"True and true. Kaff, what's your name?"

"I do not have a name. Humans call me Kaff or Kaffvarpir."

"False, true. Interesting. Though what my new spell thinks about names is probably best saved for another time."

"Just don't freak out if something I say parses as false till I have a chance to try to clarify."

"Of course not. Oh, is there anything I can do for you to trust me more?"

"Nothing leaps to mind but I don't currently have a strong need to trust you."

"Fair enough. What a day."

"I've had worse. Do you need any infinitely replicable small objects?"

"I don't doubt it... Nothing springs to mind. Food and water in a couple of hours."

"Can do."

"...So. Saving the world." Her eyes start glowing slightly again. "You have been experiencing time loops? To the best of the knowledge the world will end as you have described? The aliens and magic system are as described?"

"I was summarizing but did so without intent to deceive."

Eyes unglow. "True. Good enough for me. Perhaps Kaff can create some kind of locator tool. Genies are frequently better at making tools that other people can then use, than direct tasks."

"Magic stuff won't go in my storage space - at least locally magic stuff. Do you have anything I could try that won't cost me bargaining power? If it'll go at all I can almost certainly get it out again infinity times."

"I don't have anything magical on me other than my raiment, sorry."

"Raiment's a technical term?"