The Keeper of Night (The Keeper of Night #1)(14)


Neven’s fingers curled tighter around his suitcase, his lips pressed together.

Despite all the ways his parents had tried to twist him into something colder, he still looked at them as if they’d breathed the universe into existence and hand-placed every star in the sky. He clung to their small compliments and cried at their admonishment, then cried more when they told him Reapers weren’t supposed to cry. Neven’s heart was soft like a sponge, and Ambrose insulting him so casually made me want to wring his neck.

Before Cromwell could respond, the doors to the council room burst open, two High Reapers dragging in a Low Reaper whose arms and legs had been bound with thick rope.

Neven tensed, shooting me a panicked look as his eyes flashed between purple and green. I squinted at the captured Reaper’s face, but I didn’t recognize him. He couldn’t have been more than a century old.

The High Reapers dragged him toward Cromwell and forced him into a chair, chaining his ankles down. He kicked and tried to throw his weight off the chair, but the High Reaper struck him across the face and he fell still.

“High Councilor,” the Reaper said, “we’ve found Gray Westbrook, a friend of the Shinigami’s brother.”

As soon as the High Reaper said his name, I realized why Neven had looked so alarmed. He had mentioned Gray’s name before, but friend was a bit of an overstatement. Because of me, neither of us had friends—at least, not in public. No one wanted to be associated with a Shinigami, but some Reapers, like Gray, felt bad enough for Neven to help him on occasion.

Neven was too squeamish to extract souls with any kind of efficiency, so he was perpetually falling behind on his collections. Gray had reaped some of the souls on Neven’s list for him, and in return, Neven had lent him one of my books on the Salem Witch Trials. I’d told him it was a bad idea, but he’d been so determined thank Gray somehow, even though he knew that Reapers had eyes everywhere.

Sure enough, the High Reaper threw my book at Gray’s feet, the pages spilling open to the bookplate I’d pasted in the front, my name in curled script inside a wreath of ivy. Usually the bookplates kept other Reapers from stealing my books, since anyone with Shinigami property would be taunted by High Reapers. But Gray was facing something much worse than schoolyard taunts.

“He’s the Scarborough boy’s friend,” the High Reaper said. “He says the book is from him and not the Shinigami.”

Cromwell leaned forward in his chair, eyes seething. “Tell us where the Shinigami has gone,” he said.

Gray tried to bow, but his hands tied behind the chair stopped him from going very far. Instead, he just hung his head, sweat dripping from his forehead to the marbled floor.

“High Councilor,” Gray said, his voice trembling, “I never met the Shinigami. I don’t know where she’s gone.”

“But you’re friends with her brother!” said the High Reaper who had dragged him in. “You must know where he is!”

“No!” Gray shook his head. “No, we weren’t friends, I just felt sorry for him.”

Neven didn’t say a word, but his unnatural stillness told me enough. Like always, no one cared about him when the High Reapers were watching.

Cromwell didn’t move. His pale blue eyes shifted toward the second seat of the High Council, and that was all the instruction needed before the second chair Reaper rose to his feet.

Gray shook his head and surged back, nearly toppling his chair as the High Reaper drew closer.

“No, no, I swear, I have no idea!” Gray said, thrashing against the ropes.

But the High Reaper didn’t so much as hesitate, stepping forward and placing his hand on Gray’s head.

All at once, Gray’s skin grew loose and sallow, wrinkles appearing around his eyes and veins bulging from his hands where he gripped the chair. The sound of his scream withered from a young man’s voice to an old man’s grating wails, his spine contracting as he shrank down and hunched over in his seat, the pain of a lifetime tearing through his bones.

Neven closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the cool stone tunnel, trying to breathe quietly. I set a hand on his spine and rubbed gently up and down. Sometimes Neven knew what I was thinking without me saying it, and I hoped that this was one of those times. I hoped he understood that this was all because of me and my mistakes and everything I wasn’t, that none of it could ever be his fault. Neven could look away, but I forced myself to watch, not to stop time and run away like a coward.

Three Low Reapers—one in chains—stood no chance at all against the entire High Council. Helping Gray would mean almost certain death for both me and Neven, and I didn’t know Gray well enough to make that kind of sacrifice. Neven was too scared and too loyal to me to take any action, and I was too selfish to risk my life for someone I didn’t know. But I would not look away from Gray Westbrook and pretend that he wasn’t suffering because of me.

At last, the High Reaper withdrew his hand.

“I will ask you again,” Cromwell said as Gray sat panting in his chair, now as old as Cromwell. “Where has the Shinigami gone?”

Gray closed his eyes, whispering prayers in the language of Death as tears followed the jagged path of his wrinkled skin down to his chin.

“I don’t know,” he said at last. “Please, I don’t know.”

The High Reaper turned to Cromwell, his hands twitching and eyes begging for permission to continue, but Cromwell only sighed.

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