Secret Places and Hidden Things

Chapter Five

As the next few days went by, Jack might have been happy for another companion at the helm if it had been anyone other than Marelle. When he saw her in the halls, she was never overtly hostile or unpleasant, but whenever she looked at him, a cold, heavy feeling would creep into his stomach. He hadn't noticed that first day, but her pupils were long and wide like a goat's and the iris was hard and metallic, flashing green or gold as she shifted her glance. He could never quite tell where she was looking, and more than once he saw her turn away after catching his eye. She seemed to spend most of her time in the library—researching what, he couldn't guess—so he set about exploring the helm.

At first he was afraid of getting lost, but the helm always seemed to bring him where he wanted to be. When he was hungry, he found food, when he was tired, a bed. Even so, as the days went by, he found he wanted less and less. Eating became a pass-time and sleeping just marked the rotations of some inner clock. Time itself had lost all meaning. Days lasted forever, or faded into each other without notice, and when it was night he usually just wanted to explore.

There was no shortage of wonders to keep him busy, too. Though, he soon came to realize the helm operated on a more subtle level than he originally expected. He had tried to roll up the dining room table like Daerk had many times, but all it ever did was sit there. When he thought about it, he figured that, even though he was disappointed every time, he still expected the table to roll up on his next try, and this was why it didn't. He made sure never to attempt this in front of Daerk, but he suspected Daerk knew about it because, after one of their meals together, he folded the table neatly into an origami crane and walked out the door.

The thing that bothered Jack the most was that he never came across the trinket room again. He knew it was bound to appear eventually, but he was itching to find out what was in the locked box. Like the table, he figured this was why it remained elusive and tried to remove it from his mind.

One evening, while Jack was wandering the hallways, he was surprised to hear a few faint echoes of song drifting towards him from some far off place. It was a woman's voice, but it didn't sound like Marelle—or perhaps he couldn't imagine Marelle singing. He tried to follow it to its source but never seemed to get closer to it, even after hours of searching.

He asked Daerk about it, later, while they were roasting marshmallows in a small room full of antique lanterns.

"Oh that must be the wind getting ready for winter," Daerk said.

"How do you go about marking down seasons in a place like this?" Jack asked.

Daerk adjusted a log with the poker, sending sparks up the chimney. "It's been fall for a while, haven't you noticed the changing leaves?" He motioned to the window where a grove of pine trees was visible in the twilight. "Winter comes after fall, you know." He tapped his nose knowledgeably.

"It was winter just a few days ago and fall came right after it," Jack said. "Not to mention pine trees don't change color. In fact, now that I think about it, there's only been one day of summer the whole time I've been here. I remember it distinctly because the glass disappeared off the windows."

"How do you know there's only been one day of summer? What if you just pass over time faster than the rest of us civilized people?" Daerk asked with a wry smile. As if to punctuate this idea, the fox padded into the room, fully grown, and laid itself in front of the fire. Daerk raised his eyebrows, and Jack couldn't tell if he was surprised or if he was saying point proven.

"Oh, you know that fox will be tiny again tomorrow. Stop avoiding the question."

The fox yawned and pawed at their legs.

"The only thing I'm sure of is that I can't be sure about anything," Daerk said.

Jack could only shrug. He supposed Daerk was right.