He was right. It was an old dented pocket watch. Jake examined it, flipping it between his fingers. His father had one just like—
Jake discovered an inscription on the back. His vision darkened at the corners as he read what was written there.
To my beloved Richard,
A bit of gold to mark our tenth revolution
around the sun together.
With all the love under the stars,
Penelope
Jake felt the room suddenly tilt as a life he’d thought long dead momentarily came back. He stumbled to the side, tripped over the ring’s edge, and landed hard, but he didn’t even feel it. His world had become the watch—and the words written on it.
“Jake?” Marika hurried to his side. She held out a hand to help him up.
He ignored her and stared at the watch resting in his palm. His fingers closed over the gold case. It was cold and hard—and very real. He whispered the miracle, fearful of raising his voice and making it all go away.
“This is my father’s watch.”
Jake had no real recollection of how he ended up in a long narrow tunnel cut crudely out of volcanic rock. He remembered being dragged to his feet and guided by gentle prods and cautious words. He recalled more stairs, and a slab of stone that Bach’uuk and Pindor had to shoulder open. The passage lay beyond that stone, a secret tunnel. Bach’uuk led the way with a chunk of glowing white crystal raised in his hand.
They continued in silence. His friends sensed Jake had become a pond covered with a fragile sheet of ice. They trod carefully. Marika kept to his side, waiting for him to be the first to speak.
Jake carried the pocket watch with both hands. It was a weight he couldn’t bear with only one arm. It took his whole body to carry it.
“What does this mean?” he finally mumbled, more to himself than to Marika.
The question was a tumbling grain of sand that, once let loose, became an avalanche. Why is the watch here? How did it end up here? And when? Had his father and mother been to this land? Or did the watch get sucked here, like Jake and Kady, purely by accident and chance? If his parents had been here, why hadn’t anyone told him, mentioned them?
Questions swirled amid mysteries and the unknown.
Jake shuddered and finally let one last question rise. He fought against it because there was too much pain and fear around it.
Could my parents still be alive?
It was a dangerous subject. If Jake allowed himself to believe it and was proven wrong later, it would be like losing his mother and father all over again. Jake did not know if he could survive that.
Still…
He stared down at the pocket watch. He felt the heft of it, rubbed a thumb over one of the dents. This wasn’t a child’s fantasy, some hope without substance. This was his father’s watch…in his hand.
Jake gripped it and came to a realization. For now, that would be enough. He could know no more. His father had warned him against letting his imagination run wild. He said that a real scientist balanced hypothesis against tested reality.
Jake took a deep breath. He would do that here.
He’d found his father’s watch.
It was real.
What it meant remained unknown.
For now.
With his heart more settled, he allowed the words on the back of the watchcase to warm through him like a soft smile from his mother. A bit of gold to mark our tenth revolution around the sun together.
Jake’s focus broadened. He began to note the drip of water along the walls. He smelled a slight rotten-egg smell to the air. Sulfur from the volcanic vents. The passage grew warmer, even steamy.
He heard Pindor tell Bach’uuk, “We must be a league under the jungle by now.”
Bach’uuk shook his head. “Not much farther to go.”
“You keep saying that!” Pindor griped.
Jake swallowed and stared down at the pocket watch. He used a fingernail to crack it open. He felt strong enough to do that now. The watchcase was crooked, the hinges tweaked. But Jake cranked it wide. The crystal face of the watch was in no better condition than its gold case. A skittering crack split the surface. The damage flamed the fear in his heart. How had it become so beat-up?
But this fear quickly dimmed as he watched the slender second hand sweep around the dial of the watch. It shouldn’t have been moving. The watch was one of the old-fashioned ones that had to be wound with the tiny stem that stuck out at the top. But that wasn’t what truly mystified Jake and forced him fully back to reality.
The second hand spun slowly and surely.
But in the wrong direction.
Counterclockwise.
The watch was running backward!
Before he could ponder the significance, Pindor called, “The way out!”
Jake became aware of a roaring sound. Bach’uuk lifted the crystal higher to reveal a heavy cascade of water flowing over the mouth of the tunnel. No wonder the path had remained a secret. Its end was hidden behind a waterfall.
They hurried forward together.
Marika glanced over at Jake.
He closed the watch, slipped it into his pocket, and buttoned the pocket tightly shut. He kept his palm over it, not wanting to be far from it. But he met Marika’s gaze and nodded. He understood what was at stake. As war raged above, the mystery of the watch would have to wait.
Still, he remembered the second hand sweeping around and around, running backward. In his head he heard the click of the golden clockwork calendar as it turned. He pictured the bas-relief showing the breakup of Pangaea.
The key to all these mysteries was one word.
Time.
And Jake knew one thing for certain.
They were running out of it.
26
THE LONG COUNT
Spray soaked Jake to the skin.
Bach’uuk led them behind the waterfall along a thin ledge of rock. He kept a hand on Jake’s wrist. Jake, in turn, grasped Marika, who grabbed Pindor. Any misstep and they’d all go tumbling to the sharp rocks below.
But that wasn’t the only danger.
Though the falls filled the world with their rumble, beyond them the jungle croaked, roared, bellowed, hissed, buzzed, and screeched.
At last they reached the edge of the waterfall, and the ledge widened underfoot. Pindor shook his hair like a wet dog. They all caught their breath for a moment.
The full moon had risen high as midnight drew near. Scents of night-blooming flowers and dark rich loam mingled with the sweet rot of the ancient forest. Here was a primeval world where nature first practiced with seed and leaf, with tooth and claw, with root and vine. It was a riot of new life.
Jake stared out, still reeling from what the temple had taught him. He now had a name for this world.