The Lost Track of Time

by Paige Britt

  clutched the Least Possibility to her chest. Its warmth spread from her hand and

  into her heart. She opened her fingers and looked down at the tiny speck. It was

  glowing again, faint but true.

  You can do it.

  By now the dark was a feverish tempest, whipping around her with desper-

  ate force. Penelope didn’t worry that it would knock her to the ground or fling

  her into the air. There was nowhere to go — the darkness was all there was.

  Except . . . except for the light she held in her hand. Did she dare lose it?

  Fighting the pressure of the storm, Penelope raised her hand, palm flat,

  above her head. The Possibility grew heavier and its light shone brighter, but the

  dark whirled only faster.

  You can do it, she told herself.

  She braced the Least Possibility with both hands, but even that wasn’t

  enough.

  You can do it.

  Penelope gritted her teeth as her arms began to shake from the weight.

  In a fury of movement, the dark snatched the Least Possibility from her

  hand and flung it upward and away. But instead of disappearing, it hovered

  above the dark chaos like a star, piercing it in a hundred places. Penelope looked

  up and saw something that surprised her — bricks. She had thought the dark-

  ness was trying to take her away, but it wasn’t. The sucking, pulling, and

  whirling was just the black disappearing like water down a drain.

  More and more of the pit came into view as the dark slipped away. Now

  Penelope could see her shoulders. Then her waist, her legs, and her feet! Down,

  down, down went the darkness until it was a puddle on the floor once again.

  Penelope watched it shrink until it was the teeny tiniest bit of matter and

  then — pop! — it disappeared altogether.

  The Least Possibility crashed to the floor, shattering against the stones

  into a million tiny sparks. The sparks rushed to one another like magnets and

  soon they formed a small cluster.

  Penelope remembered the Great Moodler’s words about Least Possibilities.

  They can grow to be unusually large, if you really consider them. That possibility right there

  can take you all the way to the moon. Penelope didn’t need to go all the way to the

  moon. She just needed to get to the top of the pit.

  “I can do it!” Penelope shouted, and the words poured over her like

  sunshine.

  The cluster of light turned into a mound.

  “I can do it!”

  The mound turned into a hill. Penelope scrambled up it. I can do it . . . I

  can do it . . . The hill was growing so fast that no matter how hard she ran, the

  top was beyond reach. She could feel the wind in her face as the walls of the pit

  rushed past. Still the hill grew higher and wider until the pit itself began to

  crumble. In a matter of seconds, the Least Possibility burst out into the open,

  sending stones flying. Penelope slid down the side of the hill, landing with a

  small hop on the ground. And with that, she was free.

  — — —

  Penelope found herself in a room that was hardly more than a cave. A few lights

  hung from a low ceiling and a set of worn stairs cut through the rough stone

  walls. She had no idea when Chronos would return, but she didn’t want to be

  here when he did. Now there was only one thing left to do — find Dill and get

  back to the Great Moodler!

  Penelope sprinted up the stairs for several stories until they stopped at a

  gray metal door. She caught her breath, then opened it a crack and stuck her

  head out. She recognized the dark terminal where Officer X had taken her and

  Dill when they first arrived at the tower. She remembered it as a busy place,

  filled with Clockworkers and cars. This time, other than a few fluorescent bulbs

  flickering on and off, it was completely empty.

  Penelope saw a driveway off to her left and headed straight for it. She ran

  up its steep incline, her shoes smacking the concrete floor and her breath

  coming loud and hard. When she reached the top, the driveway emptied out

  into the vast courtyard between the tower and the Timely Manor. Above her a

  blue sky — not gray, but real blue — peeked out from behind fading clumps

  of darkness.

  The Fancies are lifting the Shadow! she thought with a thrill of joy. They’re

  doing it! They’re really doing it!

  If the Fancies were still able to lift the Shadow, that meant one thing —

  Chronos hadn’t restored his spell. There was still time to save Dill, if she could

  find him. You can do it, she told herself. You can —

  THWAP!

  Penelope staggered backward as a mass of blue fur engulfed her. She

  laughed and hugged the Fancy. “I’m glad to see you, too,” she said and climbed

  onboard. “Now let’s go find Dill and get out of here.”

  The Fancy took off, heading up the sides of the tower. As they flew,

  Penelope scanned the ground, but there were no Clockworkers, or cars, or

  even guards patrolling the parapet around the Manor. “Where is everyone?”

  she whispered.

  In answer, the Fancy sped up. It reached the far corner of the clock tower

  and rounded it smartly before coming to a halt. Below them, covering every inch

  of the courtyard’s northern quadrant in tight, neat rows, were the Clockworkers.

  All of the Clockworkers. Thousands and thousands of them stood facing the

  Timely Manor, arms at their sides. They looked straight ahead, staring at a set

  of double doors at the top of a grand staircase. There was a hush in the air, as if

  they were waiting for something.

  Penelope searched the crowd for Dill. He must be there, but which one

  was he? They were all dressed the same, with blue hats that obscured their

  faces. Her only hope was to see a hint of his red hair.

  At that moment the doors of the Timely Manor opened and Chronos

  stepped out. Penelope crouched down on the Fancy’s back, urging it to fly even

  higher. The Fancy hugged the side of the tower as it flew, and its blue fur turned

  gray, blending in with the stone wall and forming a perfect camouflage.

  As Penelope watched, Chronos approached a microphone at the top of the

  ornate staircase and spoke. “You have been off the clock too long. Trouble has

  sprung from your idleness.” He pointed at the sky and the fading Shadow, his

  thin lips pressed into a frown. “Soon I will restore order to the Realm. The

  clocks will begin again and so will your work!” He dug into his pocket and

  brought out his watch. Gripping it in his fist, he held it up in the air. “Never

  forget,” he shouted, “time is on my side!”

  Penelope stared down at Chronos. The blue sky and sunshine highlighted

  his pale, pinched face. She remembered looking up at him from the pit. He had

  looked powerful then, but from here he looked small and . . . and something

  else. Unhappy? Was that what she saw in his face? No, decided Penelope, he

  doesn’t look unhappy. He looks . . . he looks . . . afraid.

  The thought rang out in Penelope’s mind with absolute clarity, and she

  knew she had hit upon the truth. Chronos was afraid. Afraid the Shadow of

  Doubt would fade. Afraid the Clockworkers would see beyond it. Afraid the

  people of the Realm would believe
in the impossible and the Great Moodler

  would return.

  Penelope thought about the Realm of Impossibility. Even though she

  couldn’t see it or touch it, it was somehow there. And in its there-ness was a

  great power. According to the Great Moodler, the two Realms — the Realm of

  Possibility and Impossibility — were intermingled. One couldn’t exist without

  the other. Chronos hid that fact behind the Shadow, but the Shadow was fading

  and, as it faded, his power went with it.

  “Time is on my side!” Chronos screamed again. His voice had a whining

  undertone that Penelope hadn’t noticed before. She imagined him stomping his

  foot like a three-year-old and tried not to laugh.

  Chronos opened his fist and the pocket watch swung back and forth on its

  chain. He held the swaying watch up in front of the microphone and a soft tick-

  ing sound filled the air. Tick-tock-tick-tock-tick-tock. But just as it had done when

  Penelope was in the pit, the ticking didn’t stay soft for long. It grew louder and

  more insistent until Chronos didn’t need the microphone at all.

  The Clockworkers stared straight ahead, eyes trained on the watch. “Tick-

  tock-tick-tock-tick-tock,” they chanted in unison. With each word, a wisp of

  something like smoke escaped their lips. Soon a dark haze hovered above each

  Clockworker. Each haze grew thicker as they chanted until it began to take on

  a shape — a ghostly, human shape.

  The shapes sprouted long waving arms and beckoning fingers that sent

  chills down Penelope’s back. She had seen this darkness before — it had plagued

  her in the pit. Darker than the dark of night, the forms were like small black

  holes in the sky. Penelope knew they wouldn’t stay small for long. Sure enough,

  as soon as a dark form fully materialized, it lifted up into the air, stretching its

  long fingers toward the faint Shadow waiting above. With a sickening feeling,

  Penelope realized what she was seeing. Doubts.

  So that’s what had popped out of her mouth in the pit! She

  had unleashed her doubts and now the Clockworkers were

  doing the same.

  “Tick-tock-tick-tock-tick-tock,” they chanted.

  There was a horrible sucking sound and a bitter

  wind raced across the courtyard. The

  poor Fancy, high up in the air, rocked

  back and forth from its force.

  Penelope’s hair whipped across her face, but she kept her eyes locked on the

  scene below. The wind circled around the Clockworkers, lifting their doubts

  higher and higher. The wispy remnants of the Shadow now billowed across the

  sky as the doubts were absorbed into its growing form. The bright blue sky

  disappeared, and the sunlight vanished.

  “Tick-tock-tick-tock-tick-tock.” The chanting grew louder and stronger

  until — snap! — Chronos flipped the pocket watch closed. The chanting

  stopped. A silence hung in the air for a few breathless moments, and then:

  GONG.

  GONG.

  GONG.

  The clocks in the tower rang out. Chronos’s spell was restored.

  The booming shook Penelope’s Fancy out of the sky. It plummeted toward the

  ground, battered by waves of sound. Penelope gathered her wits and focused on

  the Fancy regaining its balance and flying them to safety. Her imaginings had

  just taken effect when she heard a sharp cry.

  “Stop!” Chronos was standing at the microphone, pointing up at them, his

  voice pinched with rage. “Stop, right now!”

  Penelope urged the Fancy on, ignoring Chronos’s command. The Fancy

  zoomed toward the nearest corner. Once they turned it, they could disappear

  out of sight. They were close, so close, when Chronos shouted something that

  stopped Penelope cold and brought the Fancy to a halt.

  “Bring him to me!”

  There was only one person Chronos could be referring to. Penelope

  slowly turned the Fancy around and saw, far below her, a tall, redheaded figure

  being led through the crowd by two Clockworkers. Penelope watched, heart in

  her mouth, as Dill was dragged up the stairs to Chronos.

  “Take him to the Passage,” snarled Chronos.

  The wide doors of the Manor swung open and Dill disappeared behind

  them. Chronos glanced up at Penelope with a smirk, then turned and swept

  inside, closing the doors behind him with a bang.

  chapter twenty-one

  Whatever fear there was left in Penelope melted into rage. “Go!”

  she shouted to her Fancy. The Fancy flew straight toward the Timely Manor, the

  wind whistling through its fur. Penelope tried to imagine it flying faster than a

  rocket — faster than the speed of light. Whoosh! She landed at the top of the stairs,

  jumped off the Fancy, and bolted toward the doors. Above them she saw a stone

  carving of a clock with rolling ocean waves on either side. The waves crested and

  then crashed, wrapping long tendrils of foam around an hourglass filled with

  sand. Below the clock, carved in elaborate scrolling letters, were the words:

  time and tide wait for no one.

  Penelope wrenched the Manor’s doors open and rushed inside. She was

  met by a long empty corridor lit from the floor. A row of dim lights outlined a

  path through the gloom and cast a weak glow on the walls, which were lined

  with grandfather clocks. The clocks were stooped with age, their shoulders

  hunched as if bearing the weight of time. Each clock had a dull silver pendulum

  hanging like a beard from its flat gray face. Something about the clocks made

  them look human.

  Penelope ran down the corridor as fast as she could. At first, the corridor

  followed the curve of the building, but before long it twisted around in a maze

  of tight spirals. Penelope ran for what seemed like miles, but the corridor never

  ended. In fact, it never even seemed to change. Every clock she passed looked

  exactly like the next. Time slipped away (did it even exist?) and still she ran.

  Hours must have passed, but not for one moment did Penelope feel tired

  or winded. Her heart pounded, not from exhaustion but from fear. I could run

  forever, she thought. For the first time in her life, forever seemed like something

  she could comprehend, like five minutes or an hour. This scared her even more.

  It scared her so thoroughly that she stopped. And there, standing in the gloom,

  was Chronos.

  “You’re late,” he snapped.

  Penelope took a quick step back. But Chronos shot out his hand with

  unnatural speed and grabbed her arm. “It’s high time I showed you how to

  behave in a Timely Manor,” he said, yanking her toward him.

  Penelope struggled against his hold. “Where’s Dill?” she demanded.

  “Where have you taken him?”

  “Come with me and you’ll see.” Chronos dragged Penelope along the

  corridor. “This is the Passage of Time,” he said, pointing to the clocks on either

  side of them. “I have a new clock made to inaugurate each year of my rule. The

  clock starts the year standing straight and tall and ends the year like this.” He

  stopped in front of a clock. Its haggard face was blank, its hands unmoving.

  “Time takes its toll on them. Not on me. By the end of the year, they are quite

  useless. I only keep
them around for old time’s sake,” he said with a nasty laugh.

  Chronos pulled Penelope farther along the Passage before stopping in

  front of another clock. It was brand-new, its wood dark and beautifully oiled, its

  back straight, standing a few feet higher than Chronos. “Look closely,” he

  whispered in Penelope’s ear, pushing her forward until her face was inches

  away from the glass.

  Penelope saw a body pressed underneath the pendulum — torso, arms,

  and legs. The head disappeared behind the clock face, but she didn’t need to see

  the head to know who the body belonged to.

  Penelope yanked her arm free and turned to face Chronos. “Get him out

  of there!”

  “All in good time. All in good time.” Chronos took out a key, which he

  inserted into a small hole in the clock face. He began to wind the key — screech,

  screech, screech. The clock glowed with the same sick green light that permeated

  the Realm.

  “Stop it!” yelled Penelope, reaching up to grab the key.

  Chronos swatted her away. “Don’t worry. He won’t feel a thing — after a

  while.” The clock began to shudder, and the pendulum came to life. But instead

  of swaying side to side, it moved forward and back, pressing against Dill’s body

  with alarming force. With every thrust of the pendulum, Dill disappeared ever

  so slightly.

  “What are you doing to him?” screamed Penelope.

  “Dill is being pressed for time. Every hour, every minute, every second

  will be drained away. Then I will have the time of his life.”

  “Please stop it,” Penelope begged.

  Chronos watched her calmly.

  “Please . . .”

  Chronos’s hand hovered over the key. “I suppose I could let him go if you

  would do one thing for me.”

  “Yes!” cried Penelope, frantic. “Whatever you want.”

  Chronos removed the key and the clock stood still. He took out his pocket

  watch. “I don’t know how you escaped the pit, but you won’t get away from me