May's anthology

The Keymaker-Short Story Contests

The intricacy with which he made every key was unrivaled by any other. Both the delicacy and strength of the keys were what made him the most famous Keymaker in the land, at the time when Keymakers were still appreciated and praised as the masters of their trade.

Even now, as the years left lines on his once young face, his persistence prevails.

Long ago, machines had started making keys, and now he is the only Keymaker left, the last of his kind. He is The Keymaker.

Although work is slow, he refuses to give up.

After all, this was what his father did, and his father before him. Generation after generation displayed their skills and imagination in making the most beautiful and yet perfectly functioning keys.

It is all the Keymaker ever knew how to do, and although times have changed, he hasn't.

He still follows the old tradition, not because he has to, but because he was born as a Keymaker, and he wanted to die as one.

What saddened him more than the lack of work, was the fact that the trade would die out with him.

He had no children, no one to carry on the tradition, so with him the trade that had prevailed for generations would disappear, be swept under the carpet of time, never to be seen again.

As night slowly settles, the Keymaker puts his latest masterpiece, the precious rose-shaped key on its proper place, his heart swelling with pride as it did every time he made another precious gift. After that, he went to bed.

That was the last handmade key since that night the Keymaker closed his eyes never to open them again.

He died, and with him, the wonderful tradition of the olden times was lost forever in the current of time gone-by.

The next morning he was found with cheeks still wet from the tears he had shed.

It was said that in his dying hours, he wasn't mourning his own death, but the loss of such a wondrous art that was key making.