In Leka, everything had the rhythm of the river and old clocks, except me, Nina. My seventeenth birthday brought me my grandmother's metal key, warm as a stone from the fire. Grandma used to be the Keeper of the Tower, but that was spoken of in whispers at home. For a week all the clocks in the town had been equally one hour late. The night after the storm, I decided to climb the tower and see what stood in time. Grandma repeated: "Don't open it until the fish stop dreaming", but the fish were dreaming louder. Under the walls it smelled of wet dust and the stones were slippery like snake skin. Oskar was waiting for me at the wicket, feigning indifference and clutching a torch with a dead battery. "Do you have a plan, Warden?" he asked half-jokingly, but I could see his nerves eating up the ends of his words. I showed the key wrapped in a black ribbon and bit my lip to avoid betraying my trembling. The tower gate had sockets I couldn't remember, and above them was the word: HOURS. Someone had scratched an hourglass sign on the gate, cut by a thin line like a scar. The key didn't fit into any lock until I slid it into the gap between the numbers. The teeth of the mechanism nibbled at the metal and the air grew warmer, like a furnace. We went inside, where the staircase wound like a river, each step having a different time. On the walls shone frescoes depicting people carrying minutes in baskets, careful as beekeepers. From on high came a drawn-out whisper, syllables sliding down the balustrade like rain. Beneath the main clock was a small door of brass, modest and without any handle. It opened when I touched it with the key, and revealed a velvet cache with a strange compass. A glass rose swirled inside and collected light that had no source. When I placed my hand on the case, the compass pointer shook and showed over the river. The clock chimed for the thirteenth time and illuminated lines began to peek out of the frescoes, like cracks. Oskar grabbed my sleeve because someone was taking too quiet steps on the stairs below. "There's no one here," he whispered, though his voice trailed uncertainly over the metal railing. The compass flared more violently and the air was permeated with the smell of damp paper and juniper. A door opened on the stone wall that had not been there a moment before, wide as a shadow. A face leaned across the threshold, very similar to mine, only younger and quite wet. It looked straight at me and moved its lips as if saying my name without a sound.