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CHAPTER ONE

The Changing of the Skyfaced Clocks

Spring’s Eve, Winter of Three

Winter’s last midnight ticked closer.

A cluster of clocksmiths idled outside the Nevermoor Houses of Parliament, watching and waiting. The sky above them was black and filled with stars, but the Skyfaced Clock in its tower wore a pale wash of Morningtide pink, unchanged these past three years.

Across town, a second group of observers gathered in Bohemia beneath a similar clock set atop a glittering music hall, surrounded by a crush of Spring’s Eve revellers. A third stood beneath the old mercantile clock tower at the docks, ignoring the sailors and fisherfolk roaring obscene shanties from brightly lit boats. A fourth lingered near the small, almost hidden clock above the stone entrance to the Gobleian Library, and a fifth stood outside the Lightwing Palace, eyeing the royal family’s extravagant golden timepiece from a respectful distance.

There were more of these uncommon clocks scattered across the pockets of the Free State. Their faces bore no hands or numbers, only a circle of empty sky inside the glass. Tonight, every one of them had drawn an audience.

Olly Wainwright was on his way to the parliament clock tower himself, clutching a leather portfolio under one arm, beating a path through the festive hordes and very nearly running late (not a good look for a clocksmith’s apprentice). He should have realised the streets would be heaving, though in truth he’d never been allowed out on Spring’s Eve before. His mum always said it was a time for family, but even she agreed this was much more important than seeing in the new year with his obnoxious brothers and noisy cousins. This was official clocksmith business.

Olly arrived breathless and bright-eyed outside parliament, and scanned the crowd for his teacher. Spotting her surrounded by other chronologists, he slicked back his hair, neatened his bowtie, and made his way over to stand proudly at her side.

Just three months into his four-year apprenticeship, Olly had already learned more from Alejandra Rojas than all his previous school teachers combined. She was one of Nevermoor’s greatest living clocksmiths, and Olly knew how lucky he was to be learning the trade from an industry legend. He only hoped he hadn’t messed it up already.

‘So sorry I’m late, Ms Rojas,’ he whispered. ‘The Brolly Rail was ridiculous, I had to let four of them go—’

But she was already deep in conversation.

‘… and nobody wants a repeat of last Eventide, but I really believe we need to let all that go and allow ourselves to be bold again, don’t you?’

There was a general noise of assent from the others, except for one older gentleman who shook his head, puffing up like a pigeon in a rainstorm. ‘I am simply not convinced, Alejandra. The signs are weak, if you ask me.’

‘Your scepticism has been noted, Sir Benjamin.’ Ms Rojas flicked a furtive smirk in her apprentice’s direction, and Olly pretended to scratch his nose to hide a grin. Sir Benjamin Church had been knighted for his work in chronology, but was most famous for being a contrarian. ‘Though one might wonder, if you truly don’t believe the clocks will change tonight, why you’re here at all?’

The group laughed appreciatively, and even the old man gave a sheepish smile.

‘Curiosity,’ he admitted. ‘And a fear of missing out. I’ve been wrong before, after all.’

‘We’ve all been wrong before,’ said Ms Rojas.

There was an uncomfortable murmur among the clocksmiths, and for a moment nobody could make eye contact. They had all been wrong, only three years ago. Publicly, spectacularly wrong. The embarrassment of last Eventide – the end of the previous Age, which had come seemingly from nowhere, an entire year earlier than anyone had forecast – still stung. Nobody wanted to be wrong again. That sort of inaccurate projection could sink a clocksmith’s career.

‘But if we’re right …’ Ms Rojas let her words trail off like an untethered balloon.

Olly knew exactly what she was leaving unsaid, and he shivered with excitement. If they were right, the bells would toll at midnight and the realm would enter a glorious and treacherous new phase.

Basking: the second phase of the Age.

The empty skies inside the clockfaces would turn from the pastel rose of dawn to the blinding yellow-gold of the sun at midday. The colour was a warning. Historically, Basking brought equal splendours and dangers, just like the heat and brightness of the midday sun. It was a time of high-risk and high-reward; a time when a course for the current Age could – would – be set, for better or worse.

Ms Rojas had once told Olly that the face of Basking was like a roulette wheel. A wheel of fate. You had to let it spin, and hope it landed somewhere good.

‘It will happen tonight, friends, I’m sure of it.’ Shimmering with excitement, Ms Rojas nodded at Olly, who took his cue to open the leather portfolio he’d carried from her office. ‘The measurable signs have all been observed, yes? Look here – planetary alignment, confirmed. Climatological conditions, perfect. Geopolitical landscape, primed for sweeping change.’ As she spoke, Olly handed her the relevant supporting documents to pass around the group. Sir Benjamin gave them a sceptical squint.

‘And of course,’ Ms Rojas went on, ‘I think most of us agree we’ve already seen the first two Disturbances.’

Old Sir Benjamin gave an indignant huff, but the rest of the group nodded eagerly.

Olly had only recently learned about the Disturbances: three unusual, spontaneous and highly visible events which signalled – to those who knew what to look for – that the phase of Morningtide was coming to an end. The kind of signs that clocksmiths watched for, waited for, obsessed over, but most regular folk had never heard of. Ms Rojas made Olly memorise them on the first day of his apprenticeship.

The First Disturbance is a Rising Tide.

The Second Disturbance is a Falling Star.

The Third Disturbance is a Waking Giant.

‘ Are we in agreement?’ said Sir Benjamin. ‘You lot can’t even seem to decide what the Rising Tide was .’

Ms Rojas smiled. ‘Well, I’m decided. It was quite obviously the Hollowpox. A mysterious wave of sickness sweeping through nearly the entire Wunimal population bears all the typical markers—’

‘That’s an obscenely Nevermoor-centric view and you know it,’ interrupted a woman in a green tweed coat. ‘The Hollowpox was contained before it affected anyone outside the capital, which doesn’t fit the universality of a Rising Tide at all. Additionally, the First Disturbance is typically an ongoing event and therefore, in my opinion, can only be the mounting unrest in the outer pockets of the Free State. Dafydd, tell her what you were saying earlier. Go on, man.’

She poked the younger clocksmith. His cheeks turned bright pink and he cleared his throat, looking deeply uncomfortable. ‘I— Well, I was only saying … That is, I’ve heard whispers of a call for reunion. You know, between us living here in the Free State and, er … the Wintersea Republic. My cousin lives near the Black Cliffs, and she says there’s a growing movement in the Sixth and Seventh Pockets—’

Alejandra snorted. ‘I’m not sure a handful of grumbling cliff-dwellers qualifies as a movement, Dafydd, but all right – let’s accept that the First Disturbance could be either the Hollowpox or this so-called unrest in the outer pockets. Moving on. We are all on the same page regarding the Second Disturbance, yes?’

Alejandra pulled several newspaper articles from the portfolio and handed them round the group; this time there was wholehearted agreement.

brIGHT YOUNG STAR OF THE DRAGONRIDING WORLD KILLED BEFORE WINTER TRIALS

‘HEARTbrEAKING WASTE OF PHENOMENAL TALENT,’ SAYS COACH OF MURDERED RIDER

SLAIN IN HIS PRIME: THE TRAGIC MURDER OF DRAGONRIDING’S MOST PROMISING YOUNG ATHLETE

‘Such a textbook example of a Falling Star,’ said Ms Rojas, ‘one might call it a little on the nose.’

‘And the Third Disturbance?’ Sir Benjamin’s question was met with silence. ‘Ah. Is this perhaps where your theory disintegrates, Alejandra? Where is our Waking Giant? We have, after all, only minutes to go.’

Olly glanced at his watch. Sir Benjamin was right. If a giant was to wake, it would wake tonight, on Spring’s Eve. There’d been plenty of speculation as to what it could be – something meteorological or political, most seemed to think, though one expert had warned of a dormant volcano in the Highlands that was due for an eruption.

‘You know as well as I do, Sir Benjamin: when it comes to the Third Disturbance, guesswork ahead of time is pointless.’ Ms Rojas shrugged. ‘We’ll know at midnight.’

As the hour drew nearer, nervous hands stilled. Silence descended. Olly dared not even blink.

When midnight finally arrived, a hurricane of held breaths was released into the air.

Pink turned to gold.

The Basking bells began to ring.

Hugs were shared and shouts of triumph rang in the air, and as his teacher clapped him joyously on the back, young Olly Wainwright felt a kind of excitement and belonging he’d never felt before.

Only in a tiny back room of his mind did he feel the slightest sense of unease. Just a prickle on his neck. A strange, quiet discomfort from the knowledge that somewhere, a giant had woken.