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“WHAT should we do about Master Charlie’s room?” Ark asked as they took a break from their chores, sipping on some tea. They had finished the majority of the cleaning, save a few odd jobs.
“What? I thought we’re not allowed to go in there…” Lille shuffled her feet awkwardly. “Besides, isn’t his room locked?”
Like most days, Charles wasn’t at home. Lille really did want to get the cleaning over and done with while she had Ark’s help, especially since Charles’s health would suffer if he was sleeping in a room full of dust.
“Say no more. Here you go.” Ark grinned, throwing something in Lille’s direction. She flailed in alarm but managed to catch it. It jingled in her hands, and she realized it was a small key.
“Ark, is this…?”
“The key to his room? Yup,” he announced proudly, grinning with a glint in his eye. “I mean, he’s not even here. He can’t tell us what to do!”
“But…,” Lille hesitated.
“Let’s surprise him. We’ll get it finished before he gets back,” Ark schemed. “He’s been really busy recently. Won’t he sleep better with a clean room?”
“…I suppose you’re right,” Lille surrendered, her tone still a little nervous. “Okay. Let’s do it.”
She was reluctant to enter Charles’s room without his permission, but with Ark’s encouragement, her desire to give Charles a nice surprise won out. Charles always said not to clean his room because he wouldn’t be able to find things, but so long as they didn’t move anything that seemed important, there was no harm in tidying it up a little.
“Ark, where did you get this key? Did Charles give it to you?” she questioned.
“Nope. To tell you the truth, Charles is using the spare key—this one’s the original. Charles lost it a while back, then I found it on one of the shelves. But it’d be no fun to just give it right back to him, so I decided to hide it. I’m pretty pleased it actually came in handy,” Ark chuckled.
“Where did you hide it?” Lille asked curiously.
“In my nest. Haven’t you seen it? It’s under the roof,” he said, gesturing.
Lille had never seen any birds in that nest, but when cleaning she made sure not to damage it just in case a type of migratory bird was using it. She never would have guessed it belonged to Ark.
“Do you sleep there?” she wondered.
“Nah, I just use it as somewhere to hide things. Didn’t you know highly intelligent birds have a habit of collecting shiny things?” he asked.
When she thought about it, their supply of silverware had been dwindling. The key was made of brass, equally as shiny as one of the lost spoons. Did that mean Ark was responsible for most of the items that went missing in the house?
“…Ark, would you mind keeping your tableware collection a little smaller?” she hinted.
“Uh-oh, you got me. I’ll try to hold back from now on, though,” he said, grinning without a hint of remorse.
Lille could do nothing but shrug her shoulders at him defeatedly. They would be in a tight spot if all the metal utensils in the house disappeared, but she decided to overlook his avian habits for the time being. Ark’s thievery had worked out in their best interests that day.
When Lille turned the key in the lock, the door inched open with a heavy creak. She had to keep reminding herself that she was only there to clean, feigning composure while her heart pounded at the thought of stepping into Charles’s private space.
“W-We’re coming in…” she announced to the empty bedroom.
Just one step inside the room, Lille felt her motivation swiftly subsiding. This was going to be an arduous task; mountains of books and parchment littered the floor.
She pushed through the towers of paper in her way and waded further into the room. The area around the bed was relatively tidy, but the desk was like a magical junkheap. Countless quills lay strewn across the surface. How could a man need so many quills when he only used one hand to write? Lille had to wonder why he had so many different inkwells lined up, too, each one tinted a questionable color. Perhaps each ink was imbued with a different kind of magic. Maybe.
The room was certainly disorganized, but Lille had to admit that being in it was very soothing: each and every item emanated Charles’s presence. She was surrounded by the furniture he used and objects he was fond of. Until now, she had never even known what sort of books he liked to read.
She decided to start by changing the bedsheets. However, as she approached the bed, a pocket watch lying by the pillow caught her eye. Why would he leave it in such a strange place? Maybe he had forgotten to take it with him that morning.
She picked up the watch and turned it over in her hand. It was large, gold, and heavy. The second hand was decorated with stars, and the design very charming. The time was wrong, though, and knowing Charles, he might have left the watch behind because he couldn’t be bothered to adjust it.
It was possible she was going too far, but Lille wanted to do everything she could to help Charles, regardless of how miniscule the help might be. But when she turned the crown at the side of the clock face, her vision suddenly began to swim and swirl.
“What…?” she gasped in bewilderment.
An incessant ticking noise echoed in her ears. She couldn’t feel the floor beneath her feet anymore, as if she were dangling in midair.
“What…? What’s happening…?” she panted breathlessly. The bed, the mountains of books, and the door all seemed to melt into one confused conglomeration of colors, stretching out and warping around her.
I don’t like this. I’m scared.
A wave of nausea suddenly overcame her. Just as she clapped a hand over her mouth, her vision returned to normal. She swallowed the excess saliva in her mouth, and took deep, frantic breaths.
Thank goodness it’s over.
Possibly, she’d simply had a dizzy spell. Something still didn’t feel right, though, and she feared she was coming down with some sort of nasty illness.
Panicked, she rushed out of the room and came face-to-face with Ark.
“Oh, Ark…” she exhaled in relief.
“Whoa. Lille, why were you in there? Or should I say, how were you in there?” He furrowed his brow, genuinely perplexed.
“Huh? Well, you gave me the key, so I…”
“Uh, no… I was just about to give it to you. See?” he insisted, opening his hand to reveal the same key he had given Lille earlier.
“That’s not possible,” she said shakily. “I mean, I…” She dug her hands into the pocket of her apron. The key was no longer there.
“…How?” she asked sadly.
What on earth just happened?
Her legs gave out beneath her, and she almost tumbled to the floor.
“Hey, Lille! What’s wrong? You’re as white as a sheet,” Ark said in concern, scrambling to support her, but his voice didn’t register in Lille’s brain. She had one theory—a theory so absurd, it wouldn’t budge from her mind no matter how much she tried to deny it. Her lips began to move on their own.
“…Ark. You hid this key in your nest, didn’t you?” Her voice shook.
“Wh—?! Lille… How did you know that?” Ark looked down at her in astonishment. It didn’t seem like he was faking it. Which meant…
“I turned back time…?”
“Lille?” Ark gave her a puzzled look. “Are you all right?”
Nausea overwhelmed her, and she felt her consciousness slowly slip away even as she desperately attempted to hold herself together.