The Clockmaker of Arindell

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The clocks in Arindell ticked more quietly than anywhere else. They didn't sound like seconds, but like thoughts taking their time. Between the river and the willows, where the light liked to rest on the water's surface, stood a crooked half-timbered building with a tower narrower than necessary but taller than allowed. Here lived Eron, the Clockmaker. His hair was silver like the gears in his pockets, his fingers moved slower than one would expect, but with a precision that silenced even dragonflies. He spoke little. But when he spoke, his voice sounded as if it came from another century—like something you recognize in the wind, even though you've never heard it. His house was full of ticking. Not loud, more like the murmuring of leaves. Clocks hung everywhere: on beams, above windows, in drawers, even on the ceiling below the bell room. But none showed the same time. "That would be rude," Eron had once said. "Every clock has its own memory." The people of Arindell didn't just come for repairs. They came because Eron also built clocks for things no one else measured. An old fisherman had a clock built that only worked when someone was thinking of him. A child was given a pocket watch that stopped for a moment whenever he lied. And a blind boy received a sundial that began to glow when it rained. But the strangest thing was his river compass. It wasn't a compass in the true sense of the word, but a delicate brass wheel with twelve small hands that only turned on the water—and only at sunrise. No one knew where it pointed. Only that it always pointed to the same place: downstream, where the fog never fully lifted and the boats' sails stood like book pages in the wind. Eron lived alone. Almost. Every morning a heron came and landed on the mooring post in front of his workshop. And every evening, when the last light trickled over the windows like honey, he sat on the bench in front of the house, turned tiny screws, and talked to his mechanical eagle. It had a name: Serel. Serel was carved from tin, copper, and fine wood. It could sing. Not like a thrush, but like an old song without words—melancholy, yet comforting. It was said that Serel could remember things that had never happened. One evening, when the sky was full of swallows that cast no shadows, Eron sat silently by the water. In his hand, he held a new clock. It was round, with an open case and only one hand. No dial. Just a circle. The hand didn't move. "Not all clocks have to keep time," he whispered. "Some wait." Then he placed it in a dark wooden box, closed the lid, and with a last glance at the river—where boats floated by like thoughts—he disappeared into his workshop. Since that day, the window in the clock tower has always been open. And sometimes, when the wind is right, you hear it again – the song of Serel, the bird who knew what time sounds like when it remembers.