Timekeeper (Timekeeper #1)(69)

“Here we are, Miss Richards. Bernice Tower. Beautiful, no?”

“Very.” She opened the auto door without waiting for him to do so for her. “I won’t be needing assistance. I should be no more than two hours.”

The driver stammered a little, but under her cool stare he simply said, “Aye, Miss Richards.”

She walked to the tower entrance and breathed in deeply, enjoying the briny smell of sea air. It made the town feel fresh and clean. Daphne allowed herself a moment to think about how much her mother would enjoy the seaside.

She entered the tower through a well-oiled door. From what she’d seen so far, it appeared there was nothing wrong, but the report said various little hiccups kept occurring. The escapement for the pendulum had gone off, making the clock sputter. Life moving in jerks rather than the smooth flow of seconds. But another mechanic had cleaned that up.

She had come today to clean the clockwork and check for anything out of the ordinary. The maintenance crew reported that the cogs were grinding together and the gears were struggling to turn. She could feel it the closer she came to the clockwork, a tug that didn’t feel normal. Like wind pulling instead of pushing.

Climbing the steep wooden stairs, she set her bag down on the landing and looked out one of the narrow windows. The sun sparkled on the ocean’s surface.

Far below stood a tall statue of a woman. Her dress was etched with the scalloped pattern of seashells, her hair long and flowing like seaweed. She pointed a stone finger toward the sea. Oceana. Dover had maintained the old shrine as well as they had maintained the tower.

Daphne turned and got to work. She laid out her tools and studied the clockwork. It was impressive, and she took a moment to appreciate the cogs and gears and chains that worked together to pull time forward.

But there was a tiny catch. Near the central cog, something clicked, and the surrounding gears had slowed as a result.

“Hmm.” Daphne crouched before the central cog. “What’s the matter with you, then?”

She closed her eyes and touched it, but couldn’t feel anything wrong. “Must be something stuck inside,” she said to the clockwork. “All right. Let’s have a look.”

Her mother had once said Daphne liked clocks more than she liked people. Daphne had never argued the point. That had been years ago, before her father died. When they still attracted curious gazes on the street, a family of odds and ends—a girl who wore trousers, a man with one foot in England and the other in India, and the woman who somehow found herself attached to them. It had gotten to her mother over time. The looks and whispers.

Then Daphne had been accepted as a clock mechanic apprentice, a profession her mother frowned upon. “First trousers, now this,” she’d muttered. “Thank God you have my coloring, at least.”

But when her father died, the accusations and the paranoia had grown worse, her mother’s mind deteriorating until the slightest provocation had made her attack Daphne with a knife.

Now that she was in the asylum, Daphne used her love of clocks to pay for her mother’s treatment. But funds were running low. She would have to ask the Lead for more assignments soon.

Daphne carefully removed each part to get to the heart of the problem. She cleaned the components as she went, time slowing as she did.

The clicking sound grew louder. Daphne frowned and unscrewed another gear.

“Be careful.”

Daphne whirled around. A little girl stared at the clockwork, her amber eyes wide. Blonde hair fell to her waist, sleek and shining. She wore a white pinafore with a bow on the back.

“What are you doing up here?” Daphne demanded. “This tower is for mechanics and maintenance crew only.”

The girl never took her eyes off the clockwork. Unnerved, Daphne glanced at the gears.

“Do you know what’s causing this?” she asked.

The girl finally met her eyes. She had a strange glow to her skin that Daphne couldn’t attribute to sunshine alone.

“Help,” the girl whispered. She pointed at the central cog. “You have to find it before—”

A metallic scream drowned out the rest of her words. Something struck Daphne and sent her sprawling across the room.

The air pressed in hot and close. Daphne’s mouth opened and closed until she could manage a ragged breath. She coughed, struggling to sit up, but a sharp pain in her shoulder made her cry out and fall to the floor.

Shouting. Churning. Daphne opened her eyes to slits and saw the little girl, bathed in ghostly gray light, still pointing at the clockwork. The girl was … flickering. Daphne’s ears rang, and all she heard was central cog.

She looked up and gasped. Cogs and gears littered the room. The clockwork frame was smoking, the air reeking of ash and melted iron.

It was then she realized what caused the strange grayness around her. The town of Dover had Stopped.

Time no longer moved, was something she could no longer control. A dream—a hallucination—a nightmare. Her vision doubled.

The little girl shouted, but her voice was fading and weak as she flickered again. Daphne struggled to listen, but the girl might as well have been chanting another language. Gritting her teeth, Daphne crawled toward the clockwork. Her shoulder ached, and desperation bit her palms.

Do something, she thought. Have to do something.

Panting, she located the central cog, which hung crookedly off its frame. Daphne wasted no time and grabbed her tools to reattach it.