Creating an Excel query...

Alright here goes...hopefully I've placed in the correct forum. what I'm trying to accomplish is taking an Excel spreadsheet, which has linked data from other excel spreadsheets and trying to query on the master excel spreadsheet. Problem I'm having is when trying to create a query the query does not recognize the data from the external spreadsheets. Fist off is it even possible for me to do this and if so how would I accomplish this task if it is possible.

There are 7 Excel files linked to 1 master excel file. they had to be created seperately due to some screwed up security procedure. Anyway, I've been asked to take the data from the master excel file, which there is no input by a user because it is updated by inputting information using the other 7 excel data files. The 7 excel files are password protected, and cannot be read without inputting a password. Now the 1 master file is used by everyone but is read only. I need to query the information in the master excel file (which again gathers information from the other 7 excel files) for ease of reading for the users. I'm hoping with all the intelligent people here someone could be of some assistance. Thank you for your help!