[An Epic Fantasy 01.0] Skip

by Perrin Briar

  “Who is it?” Jera mouthed.

  “Police,” he mouthed back.

  “What are we going to do?”

  “The only thing we can do: run.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Richard drove Shadow Dancer hard. He was a good, strong horse with the kind of breeding other horses could only dream of, but even he struggled to keep up with the pace Richard demanded. They tore through the streets of Time, Richard standing in his stirrups, leaning forward, his cloak flowing out behind him.

  Soldiers dived out of the way as Shadow Dancer bore down on them, never slowing. Richard pulled up outside the clocktower, throwing himself from the saddle and landing on his feet in the dust. Shadow Dancer panted, a thick white froth around the saddle and girth.

  Half a dozen soldiers stood at the large front door of the clocktower, bashing at it with their shoulders. Another dozen men stood to one side, rubbing their injured arms.

  Richard approached Captain Philmore. He had a bushy moustache, and his beltline was invisible beneath his stomach. He saluted when he saw Richard.

  “Sir, we have reports of a young woman matching Jera Wythnos’s description entering this shop door ten minutes ago,” Captain Philmore said.

  “Any luck breaking down the door?” Richard said.

  “We’re almost through now, sir.”

  “Is she alone?”

  “At this point we’re uncertain but we believe there is a new employee at the clocktower, though no one seems to be able to give us a name. I’ll keep on it, sir.”

  The image of a young man with a strong chin and a hat pulled down over his face came to Richard’s mind. He shook his head clear.

  “Get the door open, Captain,” Richard said. “No harm must come to Lady Wythnos.”

  “Yes, sir. And the employee?”

  Richard thought for a moment.

  “Let the chips fall where they will,” he said.

  Richard looked up at the building, his eyes catching on a candlelit glow winding its way higher and higher up the tower.

  Chapter Eighteen

  They were both panting like old warhorses. The stairs curled around an eternal blind bend that headed ever higher. Each time they passed a window they looked out, and the ground was another twenty feet away.

  “I don’t think these stairs ever end,” Sara said, leaning against a wall. “I have to stop.”

  She massaged her legs. They ached and threatened to cramp. Somewhere far below a horse neighed and men shouted. Elian moved to the window and peered out. There was a sharp crack sound like muffled thunder, and a cheer went up. Men in white uniforms ran into the shop on the first floor.

  “We’d best get moving,” Elian said. “They just breached the door.”

  On stiff unsteady legs they continued on up the stairs. Just as Elian was beginning to think Sara was right, and these stairs didn’t have an end, he bumped into a door. It had appeared suddenly, out of nowhere. It was splintered and worn, and the paint hung off it like flakes of dead skin. Etched into it was a symbol: an upside-down tear shape. At the top was a wheel, a wide circle with knobbly square bumps around the edges. At the bottom was another circle, a small round cog, and looped over them both, connecting them, was a thick chain.

  Boisterous men’s voices echoed up the stairs.

  Elian pushed the door open and was assaulted by a cacophony of noise. Things clicked and grinded and ticked and tocked. Some things popped out and then were sucked back in again. Objects hissed and bumped and bubbled, gurgled and spat, chugged and chuffed.

  Elian and Sara stepped into the giant cavernous room. Along the sides ran an intricate web of cogs and shafts and springs, all busy about their business, all working together in synchronisation. There were cogs beyond counting and other objects Elian had no name for. Many of the cogs were larger than a wagon wheel, some smaller than a copper bit, the springs thicker than a man’s arm and finer than a girl’s hair. Some of the pieces turned every second, others by the minute.

  “At least we have plenty of places to hide,” Elian said.

  There was the soft swishing of sound as something passed through the air.

  “Look out!” Elian said.

  He pulled Sara aside as a huge totem swung through the air, reached its zenith and then fell backwards, recommencing its swing. It was long and thin, with groove marks down the sides, and a big golden circle on the end. It whooshed as it passed lazily through the air.

  “It’s a giant pendulum,” Elian said.

  On the other side of the hall was a giant clock face, the arms casting malformed shadows across the floor. There was a thunking sound as the minute hand moved.

  Against the back wall of the room was an unmade bed. The blankets were musty and lay hanging off it and on the floor. In the corner was a writing desk with a stack of papers and a dozen melted candles around it. A series of images had been painted in black paint on the wall behind it: a leaning tower, a large oblong building with two men fighting in the centre, a man with his hand tucked into the front of his jacket, a tall pyramid structure.

  But Elian’s eyes were drawn to something in the centre of the left-hand wall. The pendulum swung, momentarily obliterating the object, which glimmered. Elian waited for the pendulum to swing aside, and then approached the object. It was made from a glittering golden material, except it wasn’t gold. It was a lighter colour, like tea strained through too much water, and the light didn’t bounce off it, but was somehow absorbed by it, and seemed to physically push the darkness back as if it were in a constant state of battle.

  It was arranged in the same layout as the pattern on the door: an upside-down tear drop. On the bottom was the cog. It turned, forcing a chain around, and the wheel on the bottom turned too. As the objects turned, they caused the entire wall of objects to turn with them, as if they were the centre of this whole machine. And most strange of all, Elian noticed these were the only objects to make no sound.

  But the golden objects were a little beaten-up and the worse for wear. The wheel and cog teeth were rough and barely fit with the other regular cogs around them, and there were cracks in their surfaces, hair thin, but visible. Elian reached out to touch the cog with his fingertips.

  “Bryan, don’t,” Sara said. “I don’t think we should touch it.”

  But he couldn’t help himself. He touched it, and the wheel jittered and shook, and for a moment didn’t turn, and then suddenly spun forward, and a sound like rushing water filled Elian’s ears and crashed against some unseen barrier.

  Elian looked up and saw a pair of emerald green eyes glaring back at him. He started back, and something jabbed into his back.

  “Ow! Watch it!” a voice said.

  When Elian turned around he found it was Sara. They were somewhere dark and strange, full of ticking tocking metallic noises. A dozen pieces shifted all around him. The eyes were visible through a gap in the machinery. The pieces moved, and the eyes were covered, and instead a mouth was visible. It smiled.

  “Well, well, well,” the mouth said in an unfriendly tone. “There you are.”

  Elian heard the rush of water again, and-

  He was back in the clocktower, his fingers millimetres from the glowing object’s surface. Where he’d touched there was a new hairline crack. Elian felt sick to his stomach.

  Sara bent forward and put her hands on her knees and sucked air in through her teeth.

  “My God,” she said. “It happened again, didn’t it? Time sort of shifted, right?”

  Elian eyed her.

  “You’ve experienced this before?” he said.

  “Yes. Earlier today at about… I don’t know, five o’clock or so.”

  Elian paled.

  “You felt it too, didn’t you?” Sara said.

  “Yes,” Elian said, his voice a whisper. “I thought I was the only one. I thought it was just déjà vu or something.”

  “Do you know what this means?” Sara said.

  “That this is affectin
g everyone?”

  “No,” she said. “That we’re in the most dangerous place to be right now.”

  Firelight from the stairwell made the shadows in the room shiver, and the heavy gasps of overweight men echoing in the narrow space made it sound like a beast was coming up the stairs.

  “In more ways than one,” Elian said. “Come on, we have to hide.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  The constables, sweaty and out of breath, staggered into the room. They braced themselves on the wall and got their breath back. They peered around at the cavernous room in wonder. They shared awed expressions and walked tentatively across it. They peered under the bed and writing desk.

  “They’re not here,” one of the constables said in a whisper.

  Another constable nodded, clearly spooked.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said.

  They moved back toward the door, but before they got to it the bearded sergeant with flushed cheeks and the deputy high commander, who didn’t look like he’d even broken a sweat, entered.

  “Who usually resides here?” Richard said.

  “Resides here, sir?” Captain Philmore said.

  “The bed at the end. It is unmade, and candles have been recently used. Where is the man who usually resides here?”

  Captain Philmore turned to one of the overweight constables.

  “You there,” he said. “You’re a Time local constable. Who lives here?”

  “Oh,” the man said. “That’ll be Grandfather Time, sir.”

  “Grandfather what?” Philmore said.

  “Time, sir. He’s been in charge of this tower for as long as anyone can remember.”

  “Then where is he?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I’ll send men out to find him. He won’t be far.”

  The Time sergeant moved to a constable and spoke briefly with him. The man took off with another two men.

  Richard walked along the wall, watching with passive interest the various moving parts. Cogs turned and chains tugged.

  “Seems a bit excessive to me,” Richard said, “all these cogs and pieces and pendulums. They ought to modernise it.”

  “There has been talk of modernising, sir,” Captain Philmore said, “but it just never came to be.”

  Richard strolled over to the golden object built into the wall.

  “Much too excessive,” he said.

  A short constable came up the stairs. He had two chevrons on his shoulder. He saluted Richard and Philmore.

  “Sir, there is no sign of the girl or the employee on the shop floor,” he said.

  “You must be thorough, Sergeant,” Captain Philmore said.

  “Yes, sir,” the short sergeant said. “We searched everywhere.”

  “Everywhere?” Richard said, stepping forward. “Look around you, Sergeant. There are a million places they could be hiding. You will tear this place apart until we locate them.”

  The Sergeant’s eyes darted left to right.

  “But sir…” he said.

  Captain Philmore held up a hand, silencing the sergeant. He stepped up close to Richard.

  “My lord,” he said, “as far as I understand it, this clock is more than just a machine to these people. It has guided them their entire lives, always there, like a shadow. To tear it down would be akin to telling your men in the Capital to tear down the Saviour cathedral.”

  Richard thought for a moment.

  “Thank you for that wonderful history lesson, Captain,” he said, “but the Saviour is a monument to our Lord. This building is a clock. Every man in here carries one on his person. It is nothing special. Tear it apart.”

  The captain nodded, and then turned to his men.

  “Do it,” he said.

  The constables exchanged more than a few worried expressions before unshouldering their armour and heading for the other end of the room. The men overturned the bed and writing desk. They snapped off the legs. They moved to the wall of cogs and wheels and raised their weapons.

  Just then, the cogs shifted once again, and a face appeared where there wasn’t one a moment earlier. Richard blinked. Elian had a confused expression on his face, stepping back, and a voice said, “Ow! Be careful!”

  “Wait,” Richard said to the others, who lowered their weapons.

  Richard turned back to Elian. The cogs shifted and repositioned once again. A cruel smile twisted Richard’s features.

  “Well, well, well,” he said. “There you are.”

  The pieces moved again and Elian’s face was visible.

  “If it isn’t Elian Stump!” Richard said. “What’re you supposed to be? A cuckoo?”

  “It’s a small world,” Elian said.

  Richard peered in at Elian’s enclosed space.

  “Yours certainly is,” he said.

  “Room for one more, if you’d care to join us.”

  “Thank you, but I must decline.”

  Richard’s eyes shifted to Jera.

  “Jera, dearest,” he said. “I’ll have you out of there in a moment. I just need to deal with this scoundrel.”

  “Jera?” Elian said. “I thought your name was Sara?”

  “And I thought your name was Bryan?”

  Elian shrugged.

  “I guess we all have our secrets,” he said. “Wait, so they’re after you?” Elian turned to Richard. “Why didn’t you say so? I’ll hand her over to you, no harm, no foul.”

  “Hey!” Jera said.

  “All I ask is you let me go free,” Elian said.

  “If you return the item you stole from us we might be able to come to an agreement,” Richard said.

  “I’m afraid I don’t have it on me, though I can tell you its location if you let me go.”

  “And see you riding off into the sunset? I don’t think so. But do yourself a favour now. It’s the end of the line for you. Let Jera go and we will be lenient.”

  “Lenient with the point of a sword.”

  “Quicker than you deserve, anyway.”

  “Thank you, but no,” Elian said. “I’m quite comfortable here.”

  “Very well,” Richard said.

  He nodded to the constables, who picked up their weapons and took up their attacking stances once again.

  “Tear it down,” Richard said.

  The constables swung their weapons and struck the machinery. They pulled their weapons back to strike again. The second hand of the giant clock thunked into place.

  “No!” a voice shouted. “What are you doing?”

  A man in rags ran into the room.

  “You mustn’t touch it!” he said. “You mustn’t! Have you gone mad?”

  “You must be Grandfather Time,” Richard said, looking the figure over.

  Grandfather Time hobbled into the room with fire in his eyes.

  “You have no idea what you’re doing!” he said.

  “Fugitives are hiding in the clocktower. We are freeing them. The state will rebuild the clock after we have apprehended them.”

  The old man stepped up close to Richard, so close he could smell his rotting teeth.

  “This is no mere clock,” he said. “It’s the centre of life, of everything! There’s no rebuilding it, you fool!”

  Captain Philmore stepped forward, his hand clenched into a tight fist.

  “That’s the deputy high commissioner you’re addressing,” he said. “Show some respect.”

  Richard held up a hand to Philmore.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “My captain here informed me of the clock’s importance, but I am unswayed.”

  Richard turned to his men.

  “Destroy it,” he said.

  The men hesitated, eyeing the old man with apprehension.

  “I said destroy it!” Richard said.

  They took up their weapons and swung without aggression, their weapons bouncing ineffectively off the wall of machinery.

  “Harder!” Richard said. “Harder!”

  But the men couldn’t do i
t. Richard seized a bedpost from a constable.

  “Give that to me!” he said.

  He swung at the wall. It connected with the golden cog. Once, twice, three times.

  “No!” Grandfather Time shouted, but it was too late.

  Wire-thin cracks caked the golden cog like a spider web. It shivered and shook, the cog juddering forward and then back again, and then it spun forward like a bicycle wheel without brakes, and then jolted to a stop.

  The cold wind bit at Richard’s bare skin. It whistled and moaned, whipping past him, a wave of white flecks in its wake, stinging his face and eyes. The cold bit deep into his flesh like hard steel knives.

  Richard pulled his cloak tight around himself. He was somewhere high on a bluff of hill, the mud slurping at his heels. He was dirty, and his muscles ached, and he was tired to his bones. He turned, looking around, and found Captain Philmore holding Shadow Dancer by the reins. The wind died down and the bough of a giant tree leaned back, revealing a small wooden cabin in the midst of a forest, sheltered by a grove of tall trees. The wind ruffled the fur of his coat. The tree bent over and hit the wooden cabin, blotting it from view, and-

  He was back in the room. He finished his step forward, almost lost his footing, and dropped the bedpost he held in his hands. It clattered and rolled across the floor. He gazed around at the other men. They were looking at him with concerned expressions. The short Time sergeant approached him.

  “Are you all right, sir?” he said.

  “Yes,” Richard said. “I’m… I’m fine. Tell me, did you just-?”

  The sergeant blinked, and in that instant his expression changed from concern to pure terror, and he blinked, looked about the room, and staggered back, lost his footing, and fell hard on the floor. He pushed himself backward, his eyes on Richard.

  “You’re mad!” he said. “You’ll never get away with it! Never!”

  He got to his feet and ran from the room. Richard turned and looked at the machine. Elian and Jera were gone.