Timekeeper (Timekeeper #1)(49)

“Are you sure?”

“I wouldn’t have done this if I wasn’t sure.”

Colton’s smile returned slowly. Danny watched in subdued wonder as strands of golden time threaded across Colton’s body, weaving under and around his arms, around his neck, hugging his torso, looping curlicues between his fingers. Danny had a sudden and irrational jealousy, then. He wanted to be that golden and that close. He wanted to wrap himself around Colton’s body, to be everywhere, all at once, and feel the strength and power of him.

Danny looked into the spirit’s eyes instead. He realized it was the closest he would ever get to that feeling.

Colton broke their gaze when he lightly touched the bruises on Danny’s knuckles. “I can’t believe you hit someone. I’m sure he deserved it.”

“He did.” Danny didn’t repeat what Lucas had said. He was sure Colton wouldn’t understand half of it, anyway. “They’ve suspended me for a couple of weeks, though. And I got a talking-to from the Lead Mechanic.”

Remembering that conversation caused a hard lump to form Danny’s stomach. Lucas working in the new Maldon tower, responsible for freeing his father—it was unbearable.

“Won’t the other mechanics be angry that you hit someone?”

“Half of them would probably applaud me. Lucas is an idiot. It doesn’t matter, anyway. None of them like me to begin with, except Matthias.” When Colton frowned, Danny bit back a curse. He shouldn’t have said anything.

“They don’t like you? Why not? You’re smart, and funny, and kind. And your eyes are so green. Why wouldn’t they like you?”

“It’s just how it is.” Danny turned to the window. Though the jagged edges of a bad mood pressed into him, he couldn’t quite get past Colton’s comment about his eyes. “Since Dad left, I haven’t wanted to be around them.”

“Why not?”

“How should I know?” Colton’s silence made Danny sigh. “My life’s pretty pitiful at the moment. I don’t want others to see that.”

Colton joined him at the window. “You let me see.”

Danny caught Colton’s eye, then looked away. “You’re different.”

Colton leaned his shoulder into Danny’s. They stared out at the rain, listening to each drop echo through the wooden hollow of the tower.

“It’s sad and happy at the same time,” the spirit said. “Rain.” When Danny nodded, Colton asked, “Why do you talk that way about yourself? You don’t deserve it.”

“Maybe I do.” He thought about stealing Daphne’s assignment. “Maybe I’m a villain and don’t deserve a happy ending.” Danny chipped his thumbnail against a splinter in the window frame. “I’m no prince, that’s for sure. I’m not handsome or special or any of that. I’m hopeless.”

“That’s not true,” Colton said. “You’re everything. You’re … You’re chaos and order and everything in between. Like sunshine kept back by clouds. Like the entire world’s imploded inside you, but all I see are the stars are sewn into your skin. You’re filled with soft, dark music.” His smile was gentle. “I hear it all the time. Your music.”

A timid heat rose inside him. Danny’s thumb kept chipping at that splinter, eyes fixed on its point. “What does it sound like?”

Colton’s eyes drifted back out the window. “It sounds like rain.”





Danny wrote up Daphne’s Enfield report and turned it in the next day. The protesters outside threw rubbish at him as he was leaving, like they knew exactly what he’d been doing and decided to add their own commentary.

Every week the group seemed to grow more violent. It didn’t help that a rival group was starting to form as well, protesters protesting the bloody protesters. The two sides got into shouting debates that could be heard on the third floor. The arguments always amounted to the same thing: we need the towers to live; let’s find an alternative time source.

“Why are towers being attacked?”

“Don’t you know this is going to cause another Maldon?”

“Why is no one stopping this?”

It grew tiresome.

Thankfully, now he could escape to Enfield. Danny couldn’t properly describe what he felt when he visited Colton. He usually went alone, but Brandon accompanied him whenever Daphne was given a small assignment there, which Danny continued to slip from her folder. He tried to go in the early mornings to escape notice, worried the Enfield citizens might grow suspicious, but whenever they spotted him they only greeted him with nods or small waves.

Colton’s beaming welcome always warmed away the autumn chill. Their talks grew longer and deeper as Colton came to learn more about the world outside of Enfield. In return, Danny asked him how a clock spirit lived.

“Do you ever get hungry?” Danny asked once.

“No.”

“Thirsty?”

“Never.”

Colton didn’t need to breathe or swallow. He blinked simply because it had become a habit after watching humans do it for so long. When it came to the more complex questions, such as how Colton could disappear and rematerialize at a thought, Colton couldn’t provide detailed explanations.