Arlo and the Star on the Key

"Tick. Tick. Tick." The tall clock in the corridor was as tall as a door, and all evening it counted, one tick at a time. Arlo sat on the bottom stair and counted along with it. He was a small turtle with a mossy green shell and a neck that crinkled when he looked up.

Every evening, high above the velvet corridors, the tower hummed. The hum came down the stairs like a warm wave, and it rolled along the floor and got into everything. "Hmmm, mmm, hmmm," went the tower.

Arlo had never been up there. "Someday," said Grandma Bell, who kept the castle keys on a big iron ring. "Someday, when your legs are longer." Arlo looked down at his legs. They were short and round and good at exactly one thing: going slowly.

Gus lived in the castle too. Gus was a dragon no bigger than a cat, with wings like wet leaves, and he slept in the wood basket in the corner of the kitchen.

When dust got into Gus's nose, he sneezed a tiny warm sneeze that smelled of toast. "Pfft," went Gus, and a little curl of toast-smoke floated up. Arlo giggled every single time.

Tonight, Grandma Bell's knee made its clickety sound on the stair. "Click, click," it went, like a spoon in a teacup. She rubbed it and tapped her shell twice with her knuckles. "Tap, tap," she said. "That's that. The tower needs winding, little one. Up we go, slowly."

Arlo's tummy did a small flip, the way a tummy does when the stairs go up and up into the dim. But he put his foot on the first step anyway. "I'll come," he said. "Slowly, with you."

"Then hold the rail," said Grandma Bell, "and hold my key." She put the little brass key in his hand. It was warm from her pocket, and a tiny star was cut into the top of it. "See the star? The star must point up when we turn it. Up, or the tower won't sing."

Arlo closed his fist around the key. Up the stairs they went, and the candles along the velvet corridor lit themselves one by one behind them, little yellow dots, and the air smelled of beeswax and old books.

Gus came pattering after on his small claws, bumping the rail with his tail. It grew dimmer as they climbed. The stairwell turned and turned, like a snail shell made of stone. Arlo counted the steps. "One," he said. "Two. Three." Then he stopped counting, because counting made the stairs feel longer.

"Pfft," went Gus on the third landing, and Arlo laughed out loud, and the twisty stairs felt a little less twisty.

Halfway up, Arlo stopped. His shell was wide and the stairwell was narrow, and he had turned himself sideways without noticing. Now his shell was wedged between the wall and the rail. "Oh," he said. "I think I'm stuck."

"Don't pull," said Grandma Bell, calm as milk on a saucer. "Pulling makes a turtle rounder. Wriggle." Arlo wriggled. His shell squeaked on the stone. Nothing happened.

Then Gus leaned in close, because Gus always leaned in close, and the dust on the stairs got into his nose. "Pfft!" went Gus, right by Arlo's ear. The warm toast-smoke tickled his neck, and Arlo laughed so hard that he went all soft and squiggly, and pop, out he came, onto the very next step.

"There," said Grandma Bell. "Laughing loosens a turtle better than pulling." She tapped her shell twice. "Tap, tap, that's that."

Up and up. But near the top, the hum changed. It went slower and slower, like a bee that is tired of flying. "Hmmm, hmm, hm." Then it stopped.

The quiet was very big. The candles on the stairs leaned down and went soft and low, and Arlo could hear his own heart going tap, tap, tap against the inside of his shell.

"Grandma?" he said, in a small voice. "Why did it stop?"

"Because it is waiting for its key," said Grandma Bell. "Come in, little one. You have it." She sat down on a little stool by the door and put her hand on the rail, and her eyes stayed on Arlo the whole way, kind and steady.

The top room was round. A round window looked out at the stars, and a big wooden box sat in the middle of the floor with a brass keyhole that gleamed like a drop of honey. The box smelled of beeswax, and it was quiet in a way that felt like waiting.

Gus pressed close against Arlo's leg. "I don't like it when the tower stops," whispered Gus. His wings went flat, like wet leaves on a rainy day.

Arlo's tummy flipped again, big and slow. But he put out his hand. "Hold my shell," he said. "We'll do it together. Tap, tap, that's that." His voice came out smaller than he wanted, but it came out.

He climbed onto the little step. He pushed the key into the keyhole and turned it with both hands. It would not turn. He tried harder, and his cheeks went hot, and it still would not turn. "It's stuck," he said.

"Look at your key," said Grandma Bell from her stool. "What does the star say?"

Arlo looked. The little star was pointing down at his feet, upside down. So he turned the key around in his fingers, slow and careful, until the star looked up at the ceiling, the way a star should.

Then he turned it. "Click." Deep inside the box, something let go and began to turn, and the hum came back, low and warm, all the way up from the floor and into Arlo's feet. "Hmmm, mmm, hmmm."

The candles stood up straight again. The stars in the round window seemed to hum along. Gus gave one last happy "Pfft," and Grandma Bell hummed the tower's tune, low down, and it was the very same tune.

Arlo put both hands on the box. It was warm, the way a cat is warm.

"You found the star in the dim," said Grandma Bell. "Up, when it was quiet." Arlo nodded. He tapped his shell twice. "Tap, tap," he said. "That's that."

Then down they went, slowly, the candles bowing as they passed, the corridor smelling of beeswax and old books. Gus rode in the crook of Grandma Bell's arm and fell asleep with his nose in her sleeve.

The tall clock ticked. The tower hummed above them. Arlo's legs were short and round and good at exactly one thing, and they carried him, one soft step at a time, all the way to his nest of blankets in the corner of the kitchen.

He could hear the hum through the wall. Hmmm, mmm, hmmm. It rolled down the stairs and along the floor and around his shell like a blanket, and the last thing he did was tap, tap on his shell, ever so softly, that's that.