Every morning at 5:17 a.m., the old clock tower in the town square would chime, its deep bell echoing through the cobbled streets. No one knew when it was built or who had wound it for the first time, but it had stood there for as long as anyone could remember. The townspeople had grown used to its sound, though some swore they heard something else beneath it—a faint whisper, like a voice just out of reach. Lila moved into the town two years ago, drawn by the quiet and the fog that rolled in from the sea every evening. She rented a small cottage near the square, where she worked as a bookbinder. Her days were spent restoring ancient manuscripts, her nights filled with the soft hum of the clock tower. At first, she didn’t notice the whispers. But after a while, she began to hear them—faint, almost melodic, as if the wind itself had learned to speak. One night, as she sat by the fire, the clock struck 5:17. The whisper came again, clearer this time. It wasn’t just a voice—it was a name. "Eleanor." Lila froze, her hands stilling over the book she was repairing. She had never heard the name before, yet it felt familiar, like a memory she had forgotten. The next day, she asked the local librarian about the clock tower. The woman, an elderly woman named Mabel, frowned. “You don’t want to know,” she said, her eyes darting toward the window. “That tower has a history. Not all of it is good.” Lila pressed further, and Mabel finally relented. “Long ago, there was a woman named Eleanor who lived here. She was a clockmaker, or so they say. She disappeared one night, and the tower was never wound again. Some say she’s still inside, waiting for someone to find her.” Lila didn’t believe in ghosts, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. Every night, the whisper grew louder. It wasn’t just a name anymore—it was a conversation. Eleanor spoke in riddles, asking questions that made no sense. “Why do you linger?” she asked one night. “What do you seek?” Lila tried to ignore it, but the questions haunted her. She began to research the town’s history, digging through dusty archives and forgotten records. What she found disturbed her. There were accounts of people vanishing without a trace, their last known locations always near the clock tower. Some claimed they saw a woman in a white dress, standing at the base of the tower, watching them. One evening, Lila decided to investigate. She climbed the spiral stairs of the tower, the air growing colder with each step. The gears creaked as she reached the top, and there, in the center of the room, was a small wooden box. Inside lay a journal, its pages yellowed with age. She opened it, and the words leapt off the page like living things. Eleanor wrote of her work, of the strange energy that seemed to flow through the tower. She described a ritual, a way to bind time itself, but she warned of the cost. “I have seen what happens when we try to control what is not ours,” she wrote. “The tower is alive, and it remembers. It does not forgive.” As Lila read, the temperature dropped. The whisper returned, now a chorus of voices. “You are not the first,” they said. “You will not be the last.” She ran down the stairs, heart pounding, but the tower had changed. The door behind her was gone, replaced by a solid wall. The clock still ticked, but its hands moved backward. The world outside had shifted—trees stood frozen in mid-breeze, the sky hung in perpetual twilight. In the silence, Lila realized the truth. The tower wasn’t just a place. It was a threshold. And Eleanor had never left. She had become part of the mechanism, trapped between moments, calling out to those who dared to listen. Now, Lila sits in the square, waiting. She knows the clock will strike 5:17 again. And when it does, she will answer.