Timekeeper

by Tara Sim

“Well, that’s not really my choice to …”

  His voice died away as the spirit leaned down and kissed him.

  Danny’s eyes widened. His chest rioted. Blond hair tickled his forehead, and he could see the curve of Colton’s closed eyelids, so close to his own. The spirit’s lips were surprisingly soft. It was difficult to remind himself that Colton wasn’t really made of flesh, that he was only a manifestation. He felt real enough.

  The entire universe was flooding into his chest. Time hugged him, held him, warned him of its strength beyond the gentle touch of mouths.

  Colton leaned back and their lips separated with a small noise. Danny stared at him, out of breath, feverish. He was unsure what to say now. “Thank you” didn’t seem like the proper response.

  Colton’s eyes gleamed like sunshine on metal. “Will you come back?”

  Danny remained kneeling by the clock’s turning heart, his own beating so hard that he would be shocked if Colton couldn’t hear it. The cogs seemed to listen and wait for his response.

  But Matthias’s pained face flashed across his mind. He knew what happened to mechanics who got too close to the spirits.

  Danny refused to turn Enfield into another Maldon.

  “Yes,” he lied, giving a little nod to convince him. “Yes, I will.”

  AETAS AND THE EARTH GODDESS

  When the earth was quiet and the air was still, Aetas emerged from the ocean to discover land. He walked across red dust and desert weeds, craggy mountainsides and grass so soft he wondered if they rivaled his brother Caelum’s clouds in the sky. Time rolled over him, a second and a year, so that he traveled endlessly and within the blink of an eye.

  The ocean beckoned to him. His sister, Oceana, was impatient for his return, so Aetas knelt in streams and cupped his hands in rivers to whisper of his adventures to the water. It trickled from his fingers and traveled back to Oceana, and she listened to the vesper of his stories, the breath of him under the calm, deep waters.

  Aetas was wandering across a great plain of larkspur and blackthorn when he saw a young woman dancing. She twirled and turned into a shower of violets that dizzied on the breeze, then coalesced and returned back to a maiden’s form. Her hair was the color of laurel, her skin the shade of an old mahogany tree.

  When Aetas approached, she stood still and let the wind play with the stalks of her hair. Aetas greeted his sister, Terra, she of the earth and living things. She asked after the ocean, and he asked after the sky.

  “I’m glad you are here, Brother,” she said with the voice of the wind through bamboo reeds. “I’m in need of your assistance.”

  She led him to a small settlement where humans toiled to build and plant and irrigate. A line of saplings stood as a border between the settlement and the wild hills to the east.

  “These trees need to be big and strong,” said Terra, “for these humans to benefit from their fruit and their protection.”

  “They will need time to grow,” Aetas replied.

  “And that is what I am asking for, Brother. Time.”

  He understood. Aetas spread his hands and felt the stir of time across his body, wisps and coils of golden light. They snaked around the saplings, twining through their thin branches, hugging their lean trunks. As they watched, the saplings grew and spread.

  Time tugged him forward, and Aetas frowned. For even as the trees became large and strong and green, the settlement grew and grew and grew. People aged. Tombstones speckled the landscape beyond.

  Aetas carefully pulled back until time reversed. The trees shrank and groveled toward the earth. The settlement contracted. The tombs gave up their dead.

  “I cannot do what you ask, Sister,” Aetas said. “These trees need to grow on their own. Think of the repercussions that ripple of time will have on other living beings. The humans will all be dead before they can reap the benefits of the fully grown trees. It will cheat the trees out of many years of their long lives. Let them come into their own.”

  Terra’s eyes were the grayish-green of uncut emeralds, shining as Aetas’s words opened a well of sadness within her.

  He took her dark hand in his golden one. “Do not fret, Sister. The humans will grow up wise and strong like these trees. They will care for them. And when enough time passes, both will be better for it.”

  For Aetas should have known that to play with time was to go against the wishes of Chronos, his creator, the originator of the power that flowed through Aetas’s body like veins of golden thread. He did not want the wrath of Chronos upon himself or upon his sister. He did not want to do something he would later come to regret.

  Aetas said goodbye to Terra and resumed his travels until, weary, he walked back into the ocean to rejoin Oceana, where time was his to keep. Where each thread from his body could push in and out with the tide, touching every shore, running the world.

  There were several things Danny had never expected to happen to him in the course of his life. Become the King of England, for instance, or have his name written in a history book. The list ranged from the implausible to the idiotic: become a baker, fight in a war, swim in the Thames.

  In that entire list, he had never expected to include be kissed by a clock spirit.

  Danny bit the inside of his cheek as Cassie disappeared under his auto. It was currently propped on a metal bed, its parts exposed like intestines. It had finally broken down on him, and he’d needed it towed to the warehouse where Cassie worked. He didn’t trust anyone else to take a look.

  He ran a finger over his lips again, as if amazed to find them on his face. He recalled the moment perfectly, even the eyelashes on Colton’s face, a dusky blond at the tips that darkened to black at their roots.

  It was a thing so strange, so bizarre, so exceptional, that Danny felt he ought to tell someone. But he knew all too well why he couldn’t. There would be an investigation, they would find out about Colton, and the kiss, and oh God—he would be exiled from Enfield quicker than a door could be slammed in a salesman’s face.

  “Oh, s’not good at all,” Cassie said from under the car, her voice muffled. All Danny could see of her were dark coveralls, which were baggy on her sturdy body.

  “Should I hand over my entire life savings, then?”

  “Don’t be dramatic, Dan.”

  He kicked the sole of her boot. “Then don’t say dramatic things. Tell me what needs fixing.”

  “Everything.”

  Danny pinched the bridge of his nose and counted to five. When he looked up, Cassie was sitting with her back against the auto, her auburn hair streaked with oil.

  “I just need it to run for jobs,” he said.

  “Then you may need a new boiler. Dan, I’m telling you, they’re making newer models that run like a song. Why don’t you try one of those out when you’ve the money? Loads easier than these clunky things.”

  “How much for the new boiler?”

  “Twenty quid.”

  He groaned. Due to his leave of absence, his pockets were not exactly bursting with riches.

  “Either that or pay for another tow,” Cassie said bluntly.

  Danny sighed and pulled out his wallet, hoping he had enough. Cassie examined the auto behind her. Danny knew that look. As he expected, she began to disappear back under the framework.

  “I think I forgot to check—”

  Danny grabbed her ankles and pulled her back out. She glared at him from the floor.

  “You’ve done all you can for now,” he said. “Leave it alone.”

  She huffed a breath that stirred the loose hairs on her forehead, but her expression was strained.

  Danny remembered her face on the day her older brother’s auto flipped and crashed, killing him instantly. Her skin had been bone white, her eyes hollow and dark like a flame blown out from a lantern. He’d felt the tremor between her body and his as he held her, as she wept and said that it was her fault. That William was dead because of her.

  Of course that wasn’t true. She couldn’t
have known it would happen, hadn’t thought to check her brother’s auto that day. It had been having problems, she said. She should have done more. Her sisters and remaining brother would blame her.

  It had been ten months, and Danny still saw remnants of Cassie’s terror each time he took off in his auto. He wanted to tell her he knew the taste of guilt, but the bitter burn on his tongue prevented him from saying anything. He knew it wouldn’t give her any comfort. Her loss was finite, irreversible. His loss was caught in suspension.

  “It’ll be all right, Cass,” he said gently. “I know you’ll do a good job.”

  Her mouth quivered before she pressed it into a firm line. Nodding, Cassie stood and redid her braid, resettling her mood just as she resettled the strands of hair.

  “There’s something else, isn’t there?” she asked. “You’ve that look.”

  “It’s nothing.” But he considered it again, the thought standing with its toes curled over the very forefront of his mind, waiting to swan dive into the open.

  The color of amber. The sweet smell of mechanical oil. Colton’s lips.

  “Danny Hart, your face is red!” She tried to pinch his cheeks, but shrieked when Danny picked her up.

  “I’ll find the nearest body of water and toss you in it,” he warned her.

  “All right, all right!” He put her down. “You’re a touchy bloke, you know that?”

  Would it really be so bad if Cassie knew? He could still see a fragment of fear caught in her eyes. He could provide her with a distraction at the least.

  Ducking his head, Danny mumbled, “A boy kissed me.”

  Cassie drew in a breath to shout her glee, but Danny slapped a hand over her mouth just in time. She swatted him away to reveal a Cheshire Cat grin.

  “Who was it? Where? Do I know him? How old is he? Is he good-looking?”

  Danny wished he had a shield against the onslaught of questions. He picked one at random. “It was in Enfield, on assignment.”

  “Did it just happen?”

  He nodded.

  “Oh, that’s marvelous! Who was it?”

  He shrugged and looked at his feet. “Just some bloke.”

  Danny had been kissed before, but only twice. Once by Cassie when they were twelve, to see what being kissed by a girl was like. She’d been offended that he hadn’t liked it very much. The second time had been by Barnaby Slacks, a fellow apprentice, a few years later. Danny had liked that much better. But Barnaby had been relocated to Leicester after causing some trouble on his assignments, along with any chance of them growing closer. Since then, Danny had been too shy and too busy, and no one had been willing. Until now.

  A clock spirit, of all things.

  Cassie’s face fell. “You don’t even know his name?”

  “No. Didn’t ask.”

  “Well, did you like it, then? Did he kiss the way you like?” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “Did he use his tongue?”

  “Cass!”

  “C’mon, I want to know! If you can tell anyone, it’s me.”

  He crossed his arms. He had no idea how to answer, because he honestly didn’t know. Liked it? Yes, of course. Impossible not to. But caution was slowly taking over that curious, shameful feeling initially mistaken for excitement.

  He knew what happened to those who became too involved with their projects. Compulsive cleaning, installing unnecessary parts, and excessive tinkering had all landed mechanics in trouble. An entire town had been Stopped because of this sort of misguided enthusiasm.

  Now that Danny knew the truth, he had a rather good idea of what happened three years before. The clock spirit of Maldon must have reacted when Matthias left, much in the same way Colton had harmed himself to get attention. Only the Maldon spirit hadn’t just harmed herself; she’d destroyed herself, perhaps as punishment, or out of grief, or rebellion.

  This would cause nothing but trouble.

  “Danny? You all right?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  Cassie’s blaze of excitement died down to only the embers of interest. She gripped his arm. “Don’t worry, no one’s bothered by it. Your mother isn’t, despite whatever she says about grandchildren and all that nonsense.”

  Danny was confused until he realized that she wasn’t talking about clock spirits. “That’s not—” He rubbed a hand against his face with a sigh. “Never mind.”

  “Now who’s being dramatic? Really, Dan, you’ve nothing to worry about.”

  Though he doubted that, he made himself smile for her. He reached into the wallet, but found a humiliating truth awaiting him.

  “Cass,” he murmured, “I don’t have enough.”

  Her eyes winced in sympathy. “That’s all right. We’ll do it in installments, yeah?”

  Which meant he’d have to dip into his new auto savings. Danny handed her a pound to start with. “Fix it up, all right?”

  “You know I will, don’t offend me so. You go on home and rest. And Dan?” He turned to find her glowering. “Next time, you better be decent and find out the bloke’s name.”

  He didn’t want to tell her there wouldn’t be a next time.

  Home was not his first stop, despite Cassie’s command to rest. That’s all everyone ever wanted him to do now. As if he could sleep his life away until he woke one morning to find all his problems solved.

  He went to the Mechanics Affairs building to ask if there was any news about the Maldon tower. The protesters were there again, a mix of people complaining about things they couldn’t control. One woman held up a sign that read THE GOD OF TIME WILL BE REVIVED! A man with a thick mustache was shouting at her about paganism and how there was only one true God.

  Danny ran through the masses and into the building. The atrium was congested with busy mechanics and apprentices. He took to the stairs, first checking to see if he had any new assignments, but he found nothing in his folder. Vexed, he made his way to the Lead’s office.

  Two older mechanics walked down the hall toward him. Danny’s breath caught when he saw who they were. Tom and George were both well-respected, having been mechanics for over thirty years. Tom was tall and broad, while George was short and stocky, but both wore the same look of importance that was not quite arrogance.

  Both were on the Maldon assignment.

  The bigger one, Tom, walked with a heavy limp. He had lost his right leg to an infected bullet wound in the Crimean War twenty years before. Since then, he’d worn a mechanical prosthetic.

  Someone in Shere had recalled Tom’s limp, identifying him as the mechanic who had worked on the tower before Danny arrived. Seeing him now, Danny couldn’t stop the shiver that rolled down his spine. He’d never liked Tom. Perhaps it was because his father and Matthias had never got on with him. Maybe because Tom had been Lucas Wakefield’s mentor, and had always turned a blind eye whenever Lucas decided to poke and prod at Danny. There was something about the man that bothered him, some gruff distance.

  The two older men were in deep in conversation, but stopped as soon as they saw Danny. George sighed.

  “Hello, Danny,” Tom said warily.

  This wasn’t their first meeting since the accident. They had endured Danny’s glares and suspicion. But since they’d been put in charge of the new Maldon tower, Danny had to change his approach.

  “Hello,” Danny mumbled. “I was wondering—I mean, how are you?”

  “Get to the point, boy.”

  Danny swallowed. He noticed that Tom was holding a long roll of paper in his hand. His heart leapt. “Are those the blueprints for the new Maldon tower?”

  The mechanics exchanged a look. George tilted his head slightly, an inquiry, but Tom replied with a slight but clear shake of his own. “Danny—”

  “I’d like to know how it’s coming along. I’m sure you’ve been there recently.”

  “If the Lead hasn’t said anything, we can’t discuss it with you,” Tom said. “Be patient.”

  Danny, already tipping into frustration, allowed
this to be the push he needed. “No. I’m tired of being patient. I have a right to know what’s going on.”

  “Move, boy,” Tom grunted, but Danny stood his ground and curled his hands into fists.

  “I want to see those blueprints!”

  Tom grabbed him by the vest and pushed him against the wall. Danny tried to pry the man’s hand away, but it was thick and strong, like Matthias’s. He wished his old friend were here to punch Tom in the jaw for him.

  “Listen, you annoying bleeder, I don’t care if you think you’ve got a right to know. Hundreds of people with family stuck in Maldon deserve to know, but you don’t see us lining them up for a rally. Don’t think you can try to bully us just because you’re the Lead’s favorite. I don’t care if you’re a broken little boy who needs to be treated special. That act’s not working on me.”

  “C’mon, Tom,” George murmured. “Leave the lad alone.”

  Tom frowned before releasing Danny’s vest.

  Danny leaned against the wall, fighting for breath as the two mechanics walked away without another word.

  A broken little boy. An act. The Lead’s favorite. None of it was true. But standing there, his chest throbbing with anger and disappointment, Danny wanted to believe at least one of them.

  He took a steam-run omnibus home, leaving him with only a sixpence in his pocket. The house was empty. His mother was working late again.

  Danny stared into the pantry and rubbed a finger over his lips. If only life could be like the fairy tales: a short obstacle to overcome and a reunion at the end of it, with a small chance of blindness or a dragon thrown in to make things interesting.

  He jerked when the telephone rang. Thinking it might be Cassie or the Lead, he banged a shoulder against the kitchen door to hurry into the hall.

  When he answered, an unfamiliar woman’s voice floated from the receiver into his disappointed ear.

  “Is this the Hart residence?”

  “Yes, who’s calling?”

  “Elizabeth Collins, over at the McClure and Gambol Firm. I spoke to a Mrs. Hart the other day.”

  Danny gripped the mouthpiece harder. “This is her son. She’s not in. May I take a message?”