Thief of Time - Loop of time

Susan walked back through the motionless streets, sat down in Madam Frout’s office, and let herself sink back into the stream of time.

She had never found out how this worked. It just did. Time didn’t stop for the rest of the world, and it didn’t stop for her—it was just that she entered a kind of loop of time, and everything else stayed exactly as it was until she’d finished what she needed to do. It was another inherited family trait. It worked best if you didn’t think about it, just like tightrope walking. Anyway, now she had other things to think about.

Madam Frout turned her gaze back from the rat-free mantelpiece.

“Oh,” she said. “It seems to have gone.”

“It was probably a trick of the light, madam,” said Susan. Mostly mortal. Someone like me, she thought.

***

The Thief of Time - p99