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There’s a soft click – the same as when the lock opened – when I enter the room. Looking back, I see that the borehole has darkened and closed behind me. The lock has reappeared, meaning I’d need to pick it again to reopen the borehole. That means a fast escape is out of the question.
I gulp and edge forward.
I expect the ticking noises to be linked to Big Ben, but they’re not. There’s a light ahead of me, shining through a doorway from another room, and in the glow I see that I’m not in the bell tower, but in a room made of vines. And there are cuckoo clocks everywhere.
I stop and stare at the clocks. There are scores of them, large and small, all set to the same time and ticking in chorus.
“I hope you’re not afraid of cuckoos,” the man says. I still can’t see him.
“I didn’t know that anyone was afraid of cuckoos,” I reply.
“You’d be surprised,” the man chuckles.
“It must be really noisy when the clocks strike the hour,” I note.
“Chaotic,” the man says cheerfully.
I step through into the next room, which is much brighter, and the man is waiting a couple of metres ahead of me, smiling warmly and making the greet, which I return. He’s elderly, with a head of thick white hair, dressed in dark overalls and a white, stained shirt, with a spotty bow tie. Sandals instead of shoes. His cheeks are lined with an array of ancient scars. They must have leant him a fearsome look years ago, but now they blend in with the wrinkles.
The man slips around me – he moves easily despite his age – and closes the door, muffling the sounds of the clocks.
“Cuckoo clocks were a fad in the Merge a few centuries ago,” the man says. “Devisers competed to create the most Born-like examples. Interest soon faded, but I collected a lot of the clocks and stored them here. I’ve always been a keen amateur horologist. How about you, Master Lox? Does clockwork excite you?”
“No,” I answer, then add, “and I’m not a Lox.”
The old man smiles. “Now that I don’t believe. Nobody but a skilled locksmith could have picked the lock on that borehole. I constructed it, and at the risk of sounding boastful, there aren’t many who can pick one of my locks. If you’re not a Lox, what are you?”
I hesitate, not sure how to answer, then shrug and say, “I’m Archie.”
“Nice to meet you, Archie,” the man says. “My name’s Winston, and as you’ve probably already guessed, I’m a Lox too.”
“I’m really not a Lox,” I say shyly.
“You haven’t trained?” Winston asks.
“No.”
“How peculiar,” he murmurs. “You must be highly talented if you can pick locks by instinct alone.”
I blush. “I just slip in my fingers and twiddle them round.”
Winston grimaces humorously. “In truth, that’s what we all do.”
The elderly locksmith moves across the room and I follow. We step through a doorway into a larger, even brighter room, candles poking out of the ceiling. This is where Winston lives – there’s a bed, a couch, some chairs – but it’s also where he works, as the room is full of tables and benches overflowing with locks.
The locks are made out of different types of metal, and come in all shapes and sizes, but are built to be unlocked with keys — you couldn’t poke your fingers into any of these, and I’m pretty sure the holes wouldn’t widen, no matter how often I stroked them.
Winston drapes himself across the couch and nods for me to sit in a chair. He picks up a lock and plays with it, producing a strange-looking object from a pocket.
“This is a skeleton key,” he informs me, when he catches me staring at it.
“Oh,” I say. “I’ve read about those in books, but had never seen one before. Is the lock from the Born?”
Winston looks puzzled. “Of course not. It would have dissolved here a long time ago if it was.”
“Then you have normal locks in the Merge as well?”
“As well as what?” Winston asks.
“The ones you find in boreholes.”
Winston goes on playing with the lock, but his focus is on me. “All of our locks are created like this, before being added to boreholes or objects. They change at that point, allowing us to use fingers, noises or gestures rather than physical keys. That’s common knowledge here. Which realm are you from, Archie?”
Again I hesitate, wary of revealing the truth about myself.
Winston says softly, “You’re not from the Merge, are you?”
“No,” I whisper.
He smiles. “That’s alright. I’m intrigued, but I won’t push for answers if it makes you uncomfortable. Can I get you something to eat?”
“No thanks. I’m not hungry.”
“How about a drink?”
I frown. “I didn’t think the Merged got thirsty.”
“We don’t,” Winston says, “but some of us make drinks anyway, out of mushrooms.”
“Mushroom juice?” I pull a face.
Winston laughs. “Devisers can make the liquid taste like almost anything you’ll find in the Born. It’s the same with food — our mushrooms can be converted into meat, fish, vegetables, bread... whatever.”
I whistle. “Inez never told me that.”
“Inez Matryoshka?” Winston’s features tighten with concern.
“Yes. She sent me here.”
Winston lays his lock aside and returns the skeleton key to his pocket. “Please tell me what she said.”
“A missing princess needs your help to vote, and Inez wants you to meet her on an island of pineapples in a few days.”
Winston sighs and picks up another lock, which he fiddles with while I sit in silence, staring at the now troubled-looking old man. It’s been a long day and my eyelids start to droop. Winston spots this and puts his lock aside, insisting on making up a bed for me. I try to argue – we still have a lot to discuss – but he says there’s no rush. He takes me to another room, smaller than the other two. The bed is formed out of a raised vine.
“Would you like some blankets?” Winston asks.
“That’s OK,” I yawn, lying down and stretching out. “I’ll be...”
Before I can finish the sentence, I’m asleep.
I sleep soundly, no dreams. The bed is comfortable, and I lie there awhile when I wake, smiling at the ceiling. The room is dark, but a light comes on when I clap. I get up and return to the room of locks.
Winston is waiting for me and produces a plate of crackers, with a pâté-like paste smeared across them, which is delicious. He also produces a jug of greyish liquid, which isn’t quite the same as milk, but it’s passable.
“This will all break down inside me the same as the mushrooms, right?” I ask.
“Exactly,” Winston says.
“So I won’t need the toilet?”
“Perish the thought,” he purrs, chinking his mug against mine.
Having decided to come clean, I tell Winston about myself, seeing Inez being chased, opening the borehole and following her, travelling through Diamond while she searched for a way back here, splitting up in New York.
“It was unfortunate that you ran into the SubMerged,” he tuts. “You’d think, in a city of millions, you wouldn’t cross paths with others from the Merge, but it happens all the time. One of the quirks of the spheres.”
“Do you know why she was coming to see you?” I ask.
“Yes,” he says. “I’d heard about the vote in Sapphire and the princess who’s gone missing. The realms are awash with the news.”
“What’s the vote about? And what does a princess have to do with it?”
Winston purses his lips. “I’d happily answer those questions but it’s not my place. You’re Inez’s ward, not mine.”
“I’m nobody’s ward,” I say sourly, thinking that makes me sound like a baby.
“Sorry,” Winston says, “but the decision to tell you rests with her. We don’t, as a rule, share secrets with the Born, so I understand her desire to tread carefully until she’s worked out your role in this.”
“I don’t have a role,” I snort. “I got sucked in by chance and now I’m done. I’ll be heading back to my normal life now.”
“Perhaps,” Winston says, looking at me with a strange expression. Then he clears his throat. “I don’t wish to detain you, but a few hours won’t make much difference. I thought you might like to have a go at those.” He nods at a table laden with locks.
I should leave – my foster parents will be mad with worry – but the locks fascinate me. I’m curious to find out if I can open them.
“I’ll work on a few of the locks,” I decide, “but not for long.”
“I won’t keep you a second longer than you deem appropriate,” Winston promises, then leads me to the table, where he explains that devisers transform mushrooms into metal, then pass them to locksmiths to work into locks of varying kinds.
“You mean you build locks as well as pick them?” I ask.
Winston nods. “Most locksmiths can create locks.”
“Could I?”
“Probably,” he says, “but that’s a challenge for another time.”
Winston tries me out on a host of locks, starting with the simplest kind – which I fly through – and quickly working up to complex pieces. Some of the complicated models take me several minutes to open, but they’re child’s play compared to the lock outside Big Ben.
“This is too easy,” I complain. “Don’t you have anything tougher?”
Winston tuts. “Be careful what you wish for. I have more challenging locks, but some would take you several days to open, and you’ll find that a master lock has a way of commandeering your focus. Many fine locksmiths have lost themselves on fiendishly difficult locks.”
“Lost themselves?” I echo.
“We need to eat. Without nourishment...” He hesitates.
“You turn into hell jackals,” I say hoarsely.
“You know about those?”
“We ran into some in a prison and on a river of blood.” I shiver at the memories of the feral beasts with their tight skin, yellow eyes and bared fangs.
Winston continues. “Sometimes a locksmith gets so involved in a lock that he forgets to eat and wastes away. I’ve lost a couple of friends that way.”
“Could that happen to me?” I ask.
“Not here,” Winston says. “I’d wrench you free.”
“Then can I try one of the harder locks?”
“You could,” he says, “but even the easiest master lock would take several hours to open. Do you want to stay here that long?”
“I guess not,” I mutter, figuring it’s time I reported back to George and Rachel. Then I have a thought. “Could I take it with me?”
“Too dangerous,” Winston says. “You might start working on it somewhere quiet, become obsessed and starve to death.”
“So we’re done?” I sigh.
“I suppose,” Winston says, but he doesn’t get up to lead me away. He looks as if he’s thinking about something. Then he says softly, “You could return. The borehole in London allows access in and out of this zone. You could be my student in your spare time.”
“I’m not sure,” I mutter. “If a lock takes several hours to master... or days... what would my foster parents say if I kept going missing?”
“I’d train you to take breaks,” Winston says, “so you could spread the harder locks out over a series of visits, just come for a couple of hours at a time, after school or at the weekends.”
I lick my lips uncertainly. Part of me wants to jump at the offer. It would mean not severing contact with the Merge, remaining part of this bewitching sphere. But it’s also a dangerous place, and I’m not sure I’m ready to commit.
“You don’t have to decide right now,” Winston says. “Go away and mull it over. If you want to resume your studies, I’ll be here.” He stands and stretches. “Come, Archie, I’ll show you to the borehole. It’s time you returned to your own sphere and the normal life that’s waiting there for you.”