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Firestarter

Page 21

by Tara Sim


  Over the next couple of hours, Danny faded in and out of consciousness. When the door opened, he jerked awake. Colton stirred and looked up, amber eyes hazy.

  Archer came in holding the cog holder. The same two guards were with her, and at the sight of them Danny’s stomach tightened. One wore the needle device at his hip. When he caught Danny looking at it, he grinned.

  “Good afternoon,” Archer said as if they were meeting for tea. She spotted the bread Danny hadn’t eaten discarded on the floor. “Ah, Mr. Hart. It will not do to act the hero.”

  He ignored her, turning his attention to Colton. “How are you feeling? Are you all right?”

  Colton lifted his eyes from his central cog, taking in the horrible bruises marring Danny’s chest. “Oh, God. I should be asking you that.”

  “That’s enough.” Archer removed the central cog from the holder. “Time to get down to business.”

  Danny tensed. “What are you going to do with that?”

  “I assure you, I don’t plan on breaking it. It’s only another experiment.”

  “I know firsthand the consequences of your experiments,” he snarled. “Don’t you dare lay a hand on him.”

  “I don’t plan to.” Archer regarded the cog in her hand, then smacked it suddenly—and loudly—against the wall.

  Danny and Colton flinched as one.

  Archer looked between them with interest. “Colton, would you mind telling me how that felt?” When he remained silent, she shrugged. “Have it your way.”

  She placed a boot against the cog and scraped it along the floor. Colton cringed.

  “Uncomfortable?” she asked. “What about this?”

  She drew out a gun and fired it at the cog. Danny yelped in surprise, while Colton groaned in pain. The bullet might have dented the metal before glancing off, but Danny couldn’t be sure.

  “Not quite enough.” Archer held out her hand and a Builder passed her the needle device. With a click, it sprang out.

  “Stop it!” Danny snapped at her. “Do you want to put the entire town of Enfield in danger? If you kill their spirit, that’s what’s going to happen!”

  “My dear boy, I have no such plans. Your spirit will, by all means, live.”

  “Then why are you doing all of this?”

  She regarded him for a lengthy moment, her brown eyes thoughtful under severe eyebrows. Finally, she clicked the needles back inside their holder and pocketed the device.

  “I brought you two some light reading.” She turned to the second Builder, who handed her a pack. Digging through it, Archer pulled out a book with a faded leather cover. “Nothing like a bit of context, hmm?”

  “What are you talking about?” Colton asked.

  She blinked at Colton over the top of the book. “You’ll see.”

  Pacing the room, she opened the book and flipped through yellowed pages until at last she let out a small “aha” and stabbed a finger to the paper. “Here we are. The English is a bit old-fashioned, but I’ve translated it as best I can. ‘I have begun testing the theory and have uncovered some remarkable breakthroughs—’”

  “What the hell is this?” Danny demanded.

  Archer looked up, annoyed. “This, Mr. Hart, is a secret that has long been written out of any historical records: the last known documented proof of how the clock spirits came into being. I thought you, of all people, would be jumping at the chance to learn more.”

  Danny glanced at the book, confused. “But … how? Why would you have something like that?”

  “It was written by my great-grandfather several times down, Henry Archer.” The name triggered something in Colton, whose eyes widened. “Now, where was I?”

  She strolled around the room, reading from the book. “‘These breakthroughs, I believe, tie into the records we have stored regarding the issue of time and its measurements therein, and of the peculiar attachment between the time servant and its master. The master, in this instance, being Aetas, or being time itself. There have been certain issues, certain incidents, involving a time servant and the way in which time has been affected around his person as a result.

  “‘This affectation being the most prominent in the matter of blood.’”

  Danny’s own blood began rushing faster through his body, loudly whispering in his ears.

  Archer flipped a few more pages. “‘The first experiment is set. It has come sooner than we anticipated. Aetas’s hold on us slackens, and as a result, time distorts around us. If we wait any longer, it may be too late. We have already chosen a subject. He is a time servant, a strong man named Stephen. We joke that he will be our martyr, our own St. Stephen, like his Christian namesake. No doubt that is what we will call his tower when construction has been completed.’”

  Colton and Danny looked down at Big Ben’s cog in horror.

  “‘It is done,’” she read on, turning the page delicately. “‘The man was dragged like a pig to slaughter, poor beast, and bled over the cogs with which we will build the foundation of our first victory. The first clock tower will preside over London, and it will be a magnificent sight. Our emissaries are traveling now to the nearby towns and villages to repeat the process. Soon, the rest of the world will be regulated as London is. Soon, we will forget about Aetas and how he forsook us, condemning us to this hell.’”

  She closed the book with a sigh. “It goes on for quite a few volumes, spelling out the procedures, the countries that converted and in what order, the meticulous journey of destroying all evidence in his wake. You must agree, he was very thorough. No one has known how to build functioning clock towers for centuries.”

  Danny tried to swallow, but his throat had gone dry. “How … How long have you known?”

  “Many years.”

  “And you never thought to tell anybody? What about when the Union tried to build the new Maldon tower?”

  She shrugged. “It wasn’t my responsibility as a member of the Archer family. My responsibility was to keep the world happy and ignorant. I wouldn’t dare break hearts by revealing the ugly truth. And so the world’s leaders celebrated the towers, protected them, funded people like you to care for them.

  “But no one can stay happy and ignorant for long, isn’t that so?” She ran a finger down Colton’s cheek, and he jerked it away. “You know the truth about your demise, don’t you? Other spirits are beginning to awaken to this knowledge as well, ever since Aetas’s prison was located. We have your leader to thank for that—Mr. Holmes, is it? The Crown commissioned me to put a stop to his bothersome efforts, but I have grander plans than that. I’ll protect my family’s legacy, and the world can go on happy and ignorant.”

  “Except it can’t,” Danny snapped. “They know something’s different now. Time continued on even after Zavier tore down those towers, and a new area of time was created when you rebuilt the Khurja tower. People will investigate. Mechanics are going to want to know the truth. And when they do—”

  Archer laughed, cutting and dismissive. “Don’t you understand, boy? Even if some of the mechanics found out, they wouldn’t do a thing about it. No, such a discovery would cause too much panic. They’ll keep any such knowledge out of history books. Millions of citizens will continue on as they always have, and people like you with your ability to sense time will continue on as clock mechanics, maintaining the order of the world. Weren’t you happy as a mechanic? Didn’t it satisfy a yearning deep within you? Aren’t you fascinated by clocks and how they work, and so proud to understand them in a way ordinary people cannot?”

  All she said was true, but Danny’s connection to time had been forever tainted. The most fulfilling element of his life had proven to be nothing but a bloody secret.

  “The Archer family understands this yearning. Henry Archer did everything in his power to nurture it, to manifest it into what it is today.” Archer’s voice had taken on a fervent note, though it was strangely angry. If Danny looked close enough, he could see the tick of her jaw as she clenched her teeth toget
her, the flash of something half buried in her eyes. “I plan to do the same. No—better. The new tower in Khurja is only a prototype, the beginning of a new wave of time innovation, but now we can set our sights on London as our base of operations.”

  “Innovation? What does that even mean?”

  “It means, Mr. Hart, that I will be the founder of a better world.” She spread her gloved hands before her. “The clock towers as they are now are brittle and old. They fall into disrepair and put people in danger. But if we can find a stronger magic, a deeper connection between spirit and time … Imagine such a world. Indestructible towers.” She grinned in excitement, her eyes glazed with this vision of the future.

  It was so similar to what Zavier had told him that Danny felt queasy. But whereas Zavier thought the solution was to do away with all towers, the woman before him wanted to rebuild their foundations.

  Indestructible. Was such a thing possible?

  She noticed the interest in his eyes and stepped closer. “Yes,” she breathed. “Yes, Mr. Hart, what I say is achievable. You must want this for Enfield’s tower, do you not? To stay forever with your spirit?”

  He hesitated, glancing at Colton. The spirit was staring at the floor, dangerously still. Did he want Colton’s tower to be indestructible? Of course he did.

  But did Colton?

  “Look at the new Khurja tower if you have any doubts,” Archer continued when he stayed silent. “By using a higher concentration of blood, using two or even three times the servants per tower, the power we can eke out of the towers is that much stronger.”

  That snapped Danny out of his thoughts. Appalled that he had even been considering it, he scowled at Archer. “Unlike the Builders, I’m not interested in taking innocent lives.”

  Archer scoffed in amusement. “No life is innocent.”

  Danny opened his mouth to retort when Colton’s voice broke in.

  “How could you?”

  They both looked over at the spirit. His amber eyes blazed as he glared at Archer, his teeth half-bared. There was something feral within him, something Danny had only seen a handful of times, which frightened him to his marrow.

  “You knew,” Colton said, his voice dangerously low. “You knew, and your father before you, and his father before. For years and years, your family knew. And still you did nothing.”

  “It wasn’t our place to disrupt—”

  “They killed me.” His voice broke. “Your ancestor ordered men to hold me down and slit my throat. I died as my parents watched. My sister. My friends. I had to endure centuries trapped in that tower, alone. I was forced to forget who I was, what I was. And now you’re doing the same thing. You killed Lalita. You’ve probably killed another mechanic by now, and are planning to kill more.”

  The sound of groaning metal filled the room. Danny realized it was coming from Colton’s restraints. The cogs nearby began to glow with the force of Colton’s rage, adding strength to the amplifiers Dae had installed.

  Alarm crossed Archer’s face as she realized the same thing. She threw the book down and swiftly moved to Danny’s side, tugging the sleeve of his shirt over his injured shoulder. Without warning, she grabbed his wound and squeezed—hard.

  Danny screamed, trying to shrink away, but his restraints wouldn’t allow him to move. Colton froze, eyes meeting Archer’s across the distance. The Builders by the door put their hands on their guns, wary.

  “Get away from him,” Colton said.

  Archer released a shaky laugh. “Now, now. That’s no way to behave, Mr. Bell.”

  Colton’s head jerked back as if he’d been slapped.

  “That was your family name, was it not?” she asked. “It’s right there in Henry Archer’s records. ‘Colton Bell of Enfield, aged seventeen years and eight months, died on the evening of April—’”

  “Stop it,” Colton whispered.

  “So long as you stop this foolishness, Mr. Bell.” She squeezed Danny’s shoulder again and he grunted. A bead of blood rolled down his chest.

  Colton followed it with his eyes, the rest of him unmoving.

  Archer released Danny, but eyed the wound with new interest. “Unfortunately, we will have to take those cogs away from you again. But first …” She picked up Big Ben’s cog, still lying on the floor near Colton’s feet. “Indulge me.”

  Before either of them could react, she pressed the cog to Danny’s bleeding wound. He held back a startled cry as the air shivered around him. He could feel—sense—London. Smoke and steam and snow. It was so familiar that his eyes watered.

  Time jumped over his skin and prickled at the back of his neck. He drew a breath through his teeth and tried to see if he could grasp hold of it, but the connection wasn’t strong enough. The sensation fizzled away as soon as Archer removed the cog and wiped it off on her sleeve.

  “Fascinating.” She stroked her fingers through his hair, then held his face up with a strong hand, fingers digging into his cheeks. Turning to Colton, she shook Danny’s head. “What do you think, should we feed his blood to the London tower? Should this be the new face of St. Stephen?”

  Colton was utterly still. “Zavier is going to free Aetas and your secret will be revealed. You won’t be able to kill anyone else and turn them into spirits.”

  Archer released Danny. “And you’re willing to die, are you?”

  “If that’s what it takes to stop you.”

  She hummed in surprise. “No no no, we can’t have that.” Looking at the small cog in her hand, she thought for a moment, then smiled to herself. “I think, Misters Hart and Bell, there is time for one more experiment.”

  They were left alone for hours while Archer went off to plan her next “experiment.” Danny watched Colton fade in and out, eyes opening whenever a tremor shuddered through the air as Archer and the others studied Colton’s cog holder.

  Likewise, he studied Colton. He remembered the human boy from those memories, the one with blue eyes, slightly crooked teeth, and freckles. The Colton in front of him was more perfect, more beautiful, and somehow lesser because of it.

  I used to be so much more than I am now.

  Colton Bell. Danny couldn’t stop repeating the name in his head. He wondered if he’d been named after a relative, or if his parents had chosen the name at random. He wondered if Colton’s mother had ever said his full name when Colton was in trouble, as his own mother had so many times before.

  Daniel Alexander Hart, I swear if you take the mantel clock apart again—!

  Colton Bell, do you see how much mud you’ve tracked inside? Clean it up this instant!

  Danny tried to smile, but he couldn’t manage it. Colton Bell was dead.

  He closed his eyes against the tears, but they came anyway. He tried to breathe past the tightness in his throat, past the feeling that nothing could be done. That they’d been abandoned. That he was useless.

  “I’m sorry, Colton,” he whispered.

  “Don’t be.”

  He opened his eyes to find the clock spirit looking at him, tired and bleary.

  Colton smiled weakly. “Nothing’s over yet,” he reminded Danny. “Just hold on.”

  “I wish I could do something useful. I wish I could help you.”

  “Danny,” Colton whispered, “you’re always helping me, more than I’ll ever repay. This time, it’s my turn.”

  The door opened and Danny braced himself for another assault. Archer strode in with Colton’s holder slung over her shoulder.

  “Good morning, boys,” she sang. “Ready for another enlightening day?”

  Danny licked his cracked lips. “What were you doing to his cog holder?”

  “Simply adding a couple more amplifiers.” She swung it around so they could see another band of metal crossing over the two Dae had added. Danny shuddered as he thought of Dae, of the bullet hole the Builders had blown through him.

  Archer held up Big Ben’s cog and inserted it into the new pocket. “Wonderful, no?”

  “Why?” D
anny asked, his voice flat. “You don’t want to kill us—fine. But why go to these extremes? These experiments?”

  “I certainly don’t have to answer to you, Mr. Hart.”

  “You were a clock mechanic once, weren’t you?” He flung the question at her like an aerial strike, and felt the briefest moment of satisfaction seeing her lips part in surprise.

  “What are you trying to get out of me, Mr. Hart?” she asked softly. Dangerously.

  Danny swallowed. Across the room, Colton watched the exchange warily.

  “The truth.”

  Archer grinned slowly. It wasn’t the grin of someone off-kilter, someone as perversely excited as she had presented herself these last two days. In fact, the startling awareness of that smile, the sheer intelligence of it, was even more terrifying.

  “Let me tell you a bit about the Archer family,” she said in a voice as carefully controlled as her stance—the stance of one who knew how to defend herself. “Starting with dear great-great-great-grandfather Henry. What a fascinating man. It’s enough to humble the rest of us, trembling in the wake of the rock he dropped in history’s ocean.” She looked straight at Colton, her smile now gone. “The Archers are stained with blood, Mr. Hart. Imagine, if you will, what it’s like to carry that burden, to be one of the only people who knows the morbid truth of this world.” Archer blinked. “Well. I suppose you don’t have to imagine, do you?”

  Danny glanced at Colton’s throat.

  “The Archers are considered a legacy,” she went on, quieter than before. “Each Archer harboring this precious secret, knowing how the sausage is made, so to speak. What a thing to be told. What an experience to read through Henry Archer’s notes detailing every death he witnessed, how much blood he spilled across England. But this is our duty, you see? To keep the secret and to protect the towers. Did you know that Henry Archer helped establish the Mechanics Union?” She noted Danny’s shock. “Yes, it’s true. Several in our line were born with the gift of time, and many got to use it.” She tapped her fingertips against Colton’s cog holder. “Except me.”

  Danny shook his head. “You’re not—you weren’t a mechanic?”

 

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