Timekeeper (Timekeeper #1)(39)
“But then my father left.” Danny’s finger slipped off the page. “And that was that.”
France and Spain blended into one country as Danny’s vision blurred. He huffed at himself and closed the atlas.
“Never mind, that’s depressing stuff. You don’t want to hear about that.” He grabbed the book of mythology again. “Have you heard of the Labors of Heracles?”
Colton touched the back of Danny’s wrist.
“If it hurts,” the spirit said, “then why not talk about it?”
Danny shrugged. “It hurts more, talking about it.”
“Are you sure?”
Danny thought of his mother sitting by the window when she thought she was alone, her eyes faded, her face aging. The pity from his superiors and his peers alike, the way they tiptoed around him. The Lead telling him that there was still no way to fix Maldon.
“Sometimes, I … I don’t know if I can save him.” He opened the book to the picture of Perseus about to slay the Gorgon. “At this point it might take the gods themselves.”
The touch on the back of his wrist traveled down until Colton pulled Danny’s hands away from the book. Colton stared at Danny’s palms, rough and dry. His fingers skimmed the life and heart lines, the map of pale blue veins on Danny’s wrist. Like he wanted to put away every detail, the same way Danny took inventory of his clockwork, the pieces and gears that held him together.
Danny had never been so aware of anyone else in his life. Everything shrank from a universe to a pinpoint, every turn of the earth dependent on his next breath, each touch lingering until those eyes found his.
Colton pressed a hand to Danny’s chest and laid his mouth gently against his. Danny wasn’t prepared for it—the reminder that Colton was not like him, that his palms were smooth and free of flaws, that his wrist showed no veins, that his mouth tasted of copper and of sweet clean air.
He was a boy of air and dust and sunlight. Everything that had gone into the making of the world.
Danny sat at his desk, scribbling on a piece of parchment paper that had once been a grocery list. He propped his head on one hand and stared at the lines without seeing them, occasionally stopping to gaze out the window at the bland view of the next house over. The soft patter of the rain was soothing, and he left his window slightly ajar for fresh air to come through.
The breeze blew up a corner of the paper and he smoothed it down again. The paper was riddled with drawings, the mechanism sketches he’d learned to do as an apprentice, and the full-face clock sketches he did on his own. At the top of one of these he had drawn a small figure reclining on the minute hand, gazing down at another figure at the foot of the tower. He started to add Rapunzel-like hair to the figure at the top, then snorted and crossed it out with a few swipes of his pencil.
He had gone to Enfield again, this time bringing a storybook in the hopes of teaching Colton how to read. He’d caught on quickly, sounding out words until he had them memorized and could recognize them throughout the book. Danny was pondering which book to bring next when the telephone rang.
He leapt down the stairs, hoping it was Cassie, even though she’d pestered him the other day about his secret love affair in Enfield. She begged for the boy’s name, but he refused to tell her, so they continued to call him “the blond bloke.”
“Hullo,” he sang into the receiver.
“Daniel?”
The Lead. Danny swallowed his usual crude greeting to Cassie—What’s up yer bum?—and endeavored to find a professional tone. “Oh, sir. Good morning.”
“I’ll need you to come into the office today. Is that all right?”
His chest fluttered. “Perfectly all right, sir. Is it another Enfield assignment?”
He had said it lightheartedly, almost jokingly, but the Lead’s unnerving silence wiped the smile from his face.
“Something of the sort. Come down when you can.”
Danny began to sweat on his way to Parliament Square. Had the officials heard about his extra trips to Enfield? Had someone seen him talking to Colton? Was there news about Rotherfield or Shere? The wind bit and rain splattered his goggles, but Danny barely noticed. He nearly caused two major collisions before the auto came sputtering to a stop in front of the large gray stone building.
There were only a couple of protesters out today, soaked and discontent. Danny hurried past them into the atrium, where he slipped a little on the marble on his way to the stairs.
The secretary was out, so he knocked on the Lead’s door and waited for permission to enter. When he did, he found the man seated behind his desk. The kinetic toy in the corner was pattering away, the metal balls jumping back and forth. Danny took that as a bad sign; the Lead only did that when he was stuck on a problem.
The Lead stopped the toy and regarded Danny, his look more kind than stern. “Sit down, Daniel.” He did. The Lead stroked his mustache, though Danny wished he wouldn’t. It only made the situation seem more sinister.
“Daniel, how have you felt about your assignments in Enfield?”
Danny sat back and tried not to stammer into apologies. “They’ve been fine, sir. A bit labor-intensive, but that’s to be expected.”
“Yes, that’s what I was afraid of. I thought the best way for you to return to work was with a difficult assignment. And it seemed to do the trick, but then more followed. I can only imagine how tiring it must be for you.”