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[A Curious Trinket - The Curious Curio Part Two]
Delicate, feminine fingers slid along the fine mithril filigree. Aya's eye was amateur, but the craftsmanship of the piece was simply undeniable. The room was cool in the early winter evening, warmed by a fire in the tiny fireplace along the adjacent wall. Firelight contributed to several candles about the room, and a lantern sitting near the small table at which she sat perched upon her Lalafel sized stool. It was far from a fine workspace, but its what she had available.
Her effort was dedicated to the search for the locket's catch, which Verad had so defly pointed out to her the day before. It was hard to find, her fingers failed to take note of any edge or protrusion upon which to press.Â
She drew up the flat bladed spatula from the set of delicate-looking tools. Fingers were replaced by metal on the surface, accompanied with the sound of scraping as she continued the search with the more sensitive instrument. She turned the locket in her hand, keeping the blade firmly pressed against the metal surface along the long circumference. She moved slowly, waiting for her fingers to feel the slightest change of the blade's elevation. Having nearly turned it the full 360 degrees she at last felt a slight fall and rise: an edge. She turned the locket back and forth to manually confirm her find. Turning the location so that she could view it through her lens, she found it invisible still, or near enough.
She reached for the spot, applying firm pressure with her finger. The result was an immediate "click" as the locking mechanism released. She blinked for a moment, wide-eyed in surprise. She wondered how Verad had ever found it, of course a man of his trade could not be without his own surprises.
She lifted the front surface of the locket with the spatula, separating the two halves as it folded open to reveal the watch face. She studied again the intricate, ever-changing theme of the ornate filigree. It wound its way the full circle around the clock face. Each duodenary displayed a distinct theme, which shifted flawlessly from boundary to boundary.  Halone, Menphina, Thaliak and so on represented in turn. The hand that pointed to the time-of-year looked simple compared to the ornateness surrounding it, but it was of obviously unusual material, though Aya could not place it.
She turned it over in her hand several more times, drawing the once inexpensive and now worn magnification lens over her eye once more. She peered closely, searching for the means by which to remove the cover and glimpse the inner-workings of her dubious purchase. She first removed the watch hands, a feat easier to accomplish than anticipated, and then took resort to other tools: carefully probing and gliding along the watch face identifying one by one the heads of miniature screw that secured the face to the bulk of the locket's body.Â
They came out easily, as if they had been installed just the day before. With careful, painstaking care she removed tiny screw after tiny screw, then carefully lifting a latch near the top, grasped the face with forceps and slid it out of place. The fire was nothing more than embers. The room grew cold.Â
She gasped, holding the breath for the moment. She had anticipated the sight of gearwork—the sort of intricate mechanical workings that she knew she would never be able to decipher, but the sight of them still struck her with disappointing shock. Still, she leaned closer taking her time to let the sight of the inner workings sink in despite her misgivings. The gearwork was intricate and miniature, the sort one expects to find in a timepiece.Â
She probed carefully looking for the spring that would be the piece's source of tension-energy. A spring to slowly drive the clockwork in its preset pattern, at its preset pace. There was no sign. She furrowed her brow, the search continued.
The two lit candles burned low. The evening had worn on into night. The howl of a chill wind blasted the exterior wall. Lantern light still held strong, the room's occupant having long grown accustomed to its pungent perfume. She continued to trace the gear work part by part, finding each individual piece making more sense when returned to on the second and third occasion.Â
Yet, the spring, the coil, or tension bar that provided power was nowhere to be found. She had her suspicions, held firmly beneath anticipatory breaths. A glimmer of hope. The watch was broken, it had no obvious mechanical problems. Yet, would she dare to begin disassembly to test her hypothesis? What if she could never reassemble it? What if an actual watchsmith could have repaired it?
She bet not - and set to work.
Night became midnight, and midnight became small hours. Piece by intricate piece the unlikely tinker continued to focus upon her prize. Each piece and gear categorized and labelled by order and location within the watch where it was removed. She wasn't working randomly, but searching for something hidden in the case behind the gearwork. She knew it must be there, if her guess was true.
She held her breath. She drew the blade across the area again. Once more she felt the slightness of an edge in the flat. She was tired. She had wanted to stop, but curiosity had kept her alert and awake. She tested the section again, finding with certainty the edge she was looking for. Within a few moments of trial and error she had the small cover loose. She held it in place for just a moment, catching her breath.Â
She watched, riveted, as she pulled the smooth rectangular cover away, revealing the box-shaped cut out in the body of the watch beneath the clockwork. There they were: crystal fragments. In that moment she knew she had been right.
One by one she withdrew the fragments: broken shards of the crystal that had both powered the timepiece and kept it accurate. With each piece removed the design of the receptacle and its connection to the gearwork became more clear. It wasn't pure clockwork: a resonance power crystal lie at its heart. Magitek. Not quite as irreparable as Verad had thought.
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