Chapter 7 #2
“Let’s go,” he said and stepped back, waited for me to turn first.
I did, feeling slightly awkward in my skin, but maybe not entirely in a bad way?
The others were standing behind the chairs, staring at the Timekeepers who’d made themselves comfortable and waited like they had all the time in the world.
I wanted to stand, too, felt more in control that way, but then Mimi stepped in front of the chairs from the other side and sat as she looked up at me, eyes wide, terrified.
I didn’t think—I went and sat next to her.
The Heart boy sat next to me.
Is your name March?
I caught the question between my teeth and did my best to pretend not to feel everything that I was feeling, to focus on our surroundings—we were across from the Timekeepers now, the three of us sitting down, the rest right behind us.
“Well. Now that we’ve settled,” the Timekeeper Kohen said, and cleared his throat. His friend had crossed his arms in front of his chest, and I genuinely expected him to fall asleep in his chair any second—he looked that uninterested and bored.
“The answers,” Mimi said, raising the little notebook to show them. “What do you know about what we wrote here?”
“Everything,” the Timekeeper said, and every gear inside me groaned like it was in need of a good oiling.
“What can you tell us about it then?” I asked next because he’d already said that he wouldn’t.
“Nothing, really.”
Frustrating. “Is that because you can’t or because you’re not willing?”
“Not willing,” he said without missing a beat.
At least he was being honest.
“Then why are we here?” the Heart boy asked, his voice a caress to my ears.
“Because, Mr. Ruvane, I am not willing to tell you what I know…yet.”
Yet.
Such a simple word, yet it changed everything. It shone a brand-new light onto this whole thing.
As well as the Heart boy’s last name. I had definitely heard it before, even if I hadn’t.
“You want something from us,” I said, my voice calmer, my muscles more relaxed, my mind less crowded. Just like that, I felt a little bit safer.
“Correct,” said the Timekeeper, and my next breath came a little easier, too.
“Is it our Sparetime? Is it the money?” said the Diamond boy from somewhere behind us—and he sounded pissed now. Not an ounce of fear remained in his voice.
“Oh, no, dear boy, no,” said the Timekeeper, while his friend rolled his eyes—and slowly, so we could all see. “I don’t want your Sparetime or your money. What I want from you is simple—to go back to the Labyrinth.”
Everything came to a halt again.
The Labyrinth, he said.
As in the place where the Turning Trials were held. The same place where we woke up that day without our memories, standing in an arena with a cheering crowd.
“You must be joking,” said Mimi while the others behind us whispered, and my mind tried to come up with the best excuse it could find as to why these Timekeepers would kidnap all of us and bring us here, just so they could send us back to the Labyrinth.
It couldn’t be to play games, could it? The trials were over.
And…that’s it. That was all I was able to come up with.
“I’m afraid now is not the time for jokes, no,” said the Timekeeper. “We brought you all here because we need you to go back to the Labyrinth.”
Need, he said. Not simply want.
With every word he spoke, and with every ticking second, this Timekeeper did not look like someone who kidnapped people all the time.
On the contrary—the more I looked at him, the more I got the impression that he was very uncomfortable sitting there. Not his friend, though.
But I still had to ask, before anything, “What happens if we say no?”
A second ticked by slowly. The wide blue eyes of the Timekeeper met mine.
Yes, very uncomfortable, and also a little panicked, his expression read.
“Nothing,” he finally said. “You can be on your way.”
Another stretched second.
“We can…go?” asked a girl from behind us.
“Of course,” said the Timekeeper, like he hadn’t kidnapped us and brought us here against our will at all.
“Well then. Let’s go,” said the Diamond boy, and a couple of them moved behind us, stepped away from the chairs, but…
“Wait.” All eyes on the Heart boy’s face, but he looked at the Timekeepers. “What happens if we say yes?”
That was exactly what I wanted to know, too.
“The truth,” said the Timekeeper, and every thought in my head faded away. “I will give you the truth of everything that has happened since you came to Neverwhen for the forward Turning Trials, until the day you unwon the backward ones.”
So many words. Forward, backward, unwon.
I turned, looked at the Heart boy. He looked at me. We all looked at one another—the three of us twisting in the chairs—and it was clear to see the desire, the suspicion, the fear that colored all their cheeks. Possibly mine, too.
The truth. These men here had answers that they were willing to share with us.
“They lie,” whispered the Heart girl—possibly Levana.
“Nobody has ever agreed to tell me the truth. Not even my own parents,” said one of the Diamond girls. She was either Erith or Anika—there had been no more girl names in the notebook.
“Not even my best friend,” said Cook—and you could just hear the heartbreak in his voice.
The same heartbreak that I’d felt every single day since I went back home. Since my parents, my cousins, my friends refused to even look at me when I asked them for the truth.
Now these Timekeepers who’d kidnapped us were offering it so freely.
“I haven’t been…well.” The words slipped out of me by accident. I brought my fingertips to my lips, but they were out there now, and they all heard them.
Heat on my cheeks like someone lit a fire under my skin.
Then…
“I can’t stop running. Like I can’t stop,” Mimi whispered.
“I haven’t slept in a month.” The Diamond boy.
“I constantly feel like I can’t breathe, even when I feel the air going down my throat.” The Diamond girl—potentially Erith.
“I cry every night.” The Club.
“I never want to dance anymore.” Cook.
We looked at him—and even though logic said that not wanting to dance wasn’t really a big deal…it was. Something there, something in my gut that whispered it to me, as senseless as it sounded.
And I didn’t think I was the only one, either—the look in all their faces said they, too, understood, even without the sense.
I looked at March, hoped he’d say something, waited…
“I want to know the truth,” said Levana the Heart. “But how am I going to trust people who’ve kidnapped me? They’re Timekeepers.”
Now that made perfect sense to all of us. Rational thinking. Based suspicion. A very strong argument.
Except…
“Nobody will give me answers,” I said, a little afraid of my own words. “I think…I think I’m willing to do anything to get them.”
“That’s my life,” Mimi whispered, eyes full of tears she wouldn’t let slip yet.
“That’s a whole month of my life that’s gone, and according to this…
” She raised her green notebook in front of her face just as the first tear slid down her cheeks, as if it were happy to finally be free.
“Someone stole them. Someone stole my memories.”
She was getting angrier by the word.
And now I was getting angrier, too.
Because what if she was right? What if this was really the truth?
“Mimi, are you absolutely sure that you wrote that?” the Heart boy asked from my other side.
“Yes,” the Club said, and when she bobbed her head to nod, the rest of her tears spilled, too. “Yes—I know my handwriting. I know it. I wrote this.”
I believed her.
“So, we just…trust them?” Levana whispered, looking up over my head and to the Timekeepers. They were still sitting there, both staring at the floor in silence, as if they were trying to give us privacy.
“We don’t,” said Seth. “We don’t have to trust them. But they are the only ones so far who are willing to tell us the truth.”
“Yeah, guys. I don’t think they care about the decree,” said Cook.
“I think they would tell us,” potentially Anika whispered, all their eyes on the Timekeepers still.
“So, what do we do?” asked the Diamond boy.