Arthur Kirkland wasn't really one for antique shops, but he just felt the urge to go look around "Magica Memoriae" that day. Maybe it was the "magic" of the name that caught his eye, being a practitioner of such. Reading the whole name, the shop would be called "Magic of Memories" in the English language. Latin gave it a less cliche feel about it though.
A light bell jingled as he opened the glass door to the stuffy shop. The building itself could be considered antique, contributing to the atmosphere of the place. The dim lights in the ceiling added to it, while the white and gold Christmas lights going around the walls and atop the shelves lent a mystical feel as Arthur wandered the aisles, recognizing a few things. Long buried memories arose despite his effort to not think about them.
"See anything you fancy?" A woman's voice sounded from a spot that been previously unoccupied. Arthur turned to see the woman with short, curled blonde hair, wearing a ruffled white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a long, cerulean, velvet skirt. He met his emerald eyes with her aquamarine ones. The woman's smooth voice caught him in a trance and held it with a soft humming to a tune that seemed lullaby-like. After a moment, Arthur regained himself and cleared his throat.
"Er, I suppose. I hadn't actually intended to come in here to begin with though. I'm terribly sorry for any inconvenience, miss." The woman chuckled and took a step forward.
"No apologies needed. You came in here in need of something, and trust me, you shall leave with something you need too." Her bright eyes sparkled ironically in the light with both youth and wisdom.
Arthur looked at her questioningly, taking note to be wary of her.
"Forgive me for not introducing myself. My name is Lottie, or Charlotte if you would rather be more formal. And you are...?"
"Arthur Kirkland. Pleasure to meet you Miss-" Charlotte interrupted with a chuckle.
"Just call me 'Lottie'." She said with an unneeded, or rather late, curtsy. "Now, I trust you will ask questions if need be, and you can very well wander around the store on your own, so I will leave you for the moment." Before he could reply, Lottie turned and walked to some other part of the store. Arthur decided to continue looking around, though cautious in doing so. He didn't pay much attention to the time, but after spending nearly an hour there, Arthur found himself drawn to a plain looking box on a shelf just below his eye level. The box was about the size of the average music box. It had a keyhole on the front side with a latch and a knob on the top, all silver. The rest was plain, unengraved dark cedar wood. He tried opening the latch, but it didn't budge.
He contemplated putting it back, but why would the owner sell the box without the key? Arthur decided to look for Lottie, and just before he called her name, he felt a light tap on his shoulder. He swung around, nearly dropping the box, to see the petite blonde gazing up at him with a soft smile.
"I told you so." Arthur resisted the urge to show her the same scowl he shows to his so-called "friend", Francis. He kept a small smile as he replied though.
"Sorry to correct you, but you stated that I would buy something, whereas that hasn't happened yet." Lottie smirked in return, earning a look of curiosity from Arthur.
"But I also said that not only would you be fully capable of wandering alone, but asking me about something too, like about how that box is locked and the key is nowhere you can see." She had a point. Arthur shifted his posture, still holding the mysterious box with both hands.
"Touche." He hated saying the French word, but sometimes it was simply the best option in a conversation. "So, if I may ask, where is the key?" Her smirk remained a she reached out her hand to him.
"May I?" Arthur nodded and handed the box to her. As soon as it touched her hand, she brought the other up to reach behind his ear. Surprised by the sudden and strange action, he stepped back with a red face. Something cold grazed his ear though. Looking to where her hand hadn't moved from, there was an intricate silver key in her previously empty hand.
"Well that was uncalled for." His tone and look of surpurise made Lottie giggle as she brought her hand down to the box. "Sorry to tell you though, I know better than to fall for a cheap 'magic' trick."
"How did I do it then? How did I so practically make a key appear from behind your ear whereas it was not previously there?" Arthur thought for a moment, also noticing how she was never not smiling in some way.
"To start with, you hid the key in your-" he stopped himself. Had he finished the sentence, the remaining word would have been "sleeve", however, the way hers were rolled up indicated otherwise. She had no pockets either, and he saw that her hands had been empty before and after touching the box, aside from holding said box. A few other theories ran through his mind, but were simultaneously shot down. There was only one possibility left, and the dawning of realization on Arthur's face forced out another quiet giggle from Lottie.
"And?" Was all she said. She had always loved to see the expressions of surpurise, realization, and when someone thought up a great idea, when they spoke if something that they were excited or passionate about. She liked the positive sides of humanity in general, but she never forgot the negative, and it as hard to forgive them until she remembered their potential to be good.
"It's still simple." Arthur vaguely replied, not being particularly comfortable talking about magic to strangers, she this girl was definitely strange on top of mysterious.
"Simple but amusing." Lottie said as she handed the items in her hands back to Arthur. The key was much heavier than he imagined, as it felt to be very close in weight to the box. Once again being interrupted before he could actually speak, the door bell gave an airy jingle, signaling that another customer had come into the shop.
"When you're ready, please come to the counter." And with that, Lottie walked away to greet the other customer.
Arthur wasn't sure what to do. Should he prove her wrong and leave without a word? No, that would be rude. Set the box down and look around some more? But it piqued his curiosity.
He decided to use the key to open the box. As he turned it, there was a mechanical clicking that stopped when he could no longer turn it. A louder click notified that it was unlocked, so he flipped up the latch. Pulling on the knob on top, he lifted the lid to see a tiny doll spinning very slowly as music played from a notched cylinder to the side. The tune seemed familiar, but Arthur couldn't quite place it. Perhaps it was because he was distracted by the weird but barely noticeable aura that seemed to emanate from the inside of the box.
Arthur's curiosity and suspicion of the box led him to decide to go ahead and buy the box. He put the key in his pocket and shut the lid, followed by walking to where the counter and antique cash register were. A moment after he got to the counter, Lottie walked past him and around to the other side, her constant innocent smile still shown on her delicate, pale face.
"How much is the box with the key?" He asked. He saw a slight smirk and realized that another "I told you so" would be coming up shortly. Lottie put out her hand and Arthur gently handed the music box to her. As she flipped it over to look at the under side, Arthur noticed a turn key with a violet string attached to it. He had been wondering where the turn key was, since they are usually on the back of the box rather than hidden in the bottom.
Lottie looked at a similarly colored tag that was attached to it then set it down on the counter.
"This music box and key were made in the very same year that a famous pirate with your same name disappeared. The locksmith's name was Thomas Kingsbury, later to be known for founding the city of Kingsbury just a little under an hour's drive south from here. A clock maker made the box and mechanism. As for the doll..." she paused to debate the best way to explain without giving away too much.
"Before I continue, why don't you take another look." It seemed almost as if she were stalling, but Arthur went ahead and picked up the music box after Lottie opened it. He had only glanced at the doll before, but now he looked at the details. She had a deathly pale looking color to her skin, though that was normal for porcelain dolls. Her hair was colored a dark burgundy with side swept bangs and a ponytail that only reached the nape of her neck. Her tiny eyes and eyeshadow had been painted as blue as the ocean, and she wore a simple violet dress that fell to her knees. Her feet were bare and her black-gloved hands were mostly covered by her long sleeves.
The doll looked strangely familiar, and the features were ahead of the time when it was made. The position was a little weird too, since it looked as if she was dancing with an invisible partner. There wasn't any clue to there having been another doll that could have been lost. Perhaps one of the strangest things though, was that despite it was over 300 years old, there were absolutely no signs of aging. Not a single crack or chip, the colors were not even slightly faded, and then there was still that nagging feeling that he had seen a girl like that somewhere before. The comforting but slightly recognizable music didn't help.
"As a little hint, I was humming the tune earlier. The doll was supposedly modeled after a girl who was 'socially insane', and kept in an asylum for most of her life."
Still, it annoyed Arthur deeply how familiar everything about the box was, almost like a memory block was cast on it. Or himself.
"So, the price is 36 pounds, but I can most certainly go lower if you like." Arthur took out his wallet and then remembered that he meant to just go out to lunch and maybe stop by a general store on the way home, so he didn't bring his card.
"Like... how about thirty?" Lottie continued.
"I'm sorry, but I only have twenty-seven with me at the moment."
"Then you can simply pay the other five pounds later." She held out her hand as Arthur gave her the money and with a few clicks and a "shp", Arthur had bought himself a tagless, queer, music box. As he left the store, he caught a glimpse of the other customer's blue-grey jacketed back, noticing his or her messy blonde hair that looked to be cut carelessly and short.
After going home and working out a spell he was recently having trouble with, Arthur decided to take another look at the music box. It still bothered him that he simply could not place where he had seen the doll before. The shopkeeper was awfully strange too, and what did the box have to do with him? Did she know he was the physical personification of the very country they live in, and therefore the very same pirate Captain Arthur Kirkland that she had mentioned? He spent a good amount of time thinking about how it could all fit together, though to no avail.
He unlocked the music box again and listened to the calming tune that played as the tiny doll turned, frozen in her strange position till the moment she would become broken pieces of porcelain scattered amongst a junkyard.
Arthur eventually got over his curious frustration and kept the box locked on his dresser where he would unlock it and listen whenever he had a rather tiring day, of which was nearly everyday. Between treaties, wars, world conferences, internal affairs briefings, alliance meetings, and everything else that happened in his everyday life, he just needed a moment to relax. His only escapes were basically magic and sleep, although those often were intertwined with work too. Arthur definitely missed his days of piracy. He could do whatever he wished, the only obligation being to keep his crew alive, and even that was loose. The comforting sea breeze, the adrenaline rush of battle, and the freedom. Sure, the world was meaner and not everyone was "free", but he didn't need to worry about anyone. The freedom he felt on the high seas was the icing on the cake for him. How he wished to go back to that time, and honestly he could, but it would have a drastic affect on the timeline, and a paradox might even form if he wasn't scrutinizingly careful.
Even so, he had nothing left but the memories to remind him. When the British government finally got him under control, his crew, ship, and all his treasures were either taken away or destroyed before his very eyes, proving that no matter how powerful he is, it's the masses that he relies on, and the government will control the masses until anarchy takes hold.
"It was for the better of England anyway." He told himself that for probably the millionth time. He smiled though, because now he had something. Although he didn't recognize it, the music box became a memoir for him, and while it did bring back painful memories, it brought the good ones too, and that's what matters.
Three months after the purchase of the music box. Three months of locking and unlocking, but surprisingly never needing to reset the turn key. He actually couldn't even turn it when he tried, but the music played whenever he opened it.
This time, something was different. After a couple minutes of listening, the music stopped. Arthur assumed it was because it had finally come to an end, but as he stood up to go rewind it, the doll started to glow with a luminescent lavender light. He stood still, thinking about the spellbook in the drawer next to the bed that he was at the end of.
As the light grew, it traveled to the floor and shaped into a girl. The girl, in fact, looked exactly like the doll, and even held the same position. The light soon vanished, leaving the girl stumbling forward but quickly gaining her balance and standing normally. She looked around, and as soon as her eyes met with Arthur's, her neutral expression turned to one of rage. She stepped forward, fists clenched as she yelled.
"You fecking, god forbidden, barmy, good for nothing, two toned, bloody, dodgy, poxy, wyneb cach, piss-artist pirate!"
Arthur was distracted though, by the flood of memories that came into his mind. Memories from the year and a half that he had known her but somehow forgotten until now. "I can't believe... It's you."
Wyneb cach - shit face
36 British pounds is roughly equal to $60.
