The Keeper of Night (The Keeper of Night #1)(55)

Neven’s eyes went wide as he understood. He reached for his own clock and hissed as his fingers brushed it, jerking his hand away. We couldn’t keep our bare skin on our clocks for very long before our hands turned purple from frostbite, so we needed to burn her as fast as possible. I didn’t like the odds of trying to explode our only lantern a third time—my control over fire was limited, for I could only wield it as a vehicle of light and not a weapon in and of itself. I could increase the light and heat and pressure in the lantern so much that it burst, but I could hardly control the flames once it did.

But this was what Izanami had asked of me, so I had to find a way. This arctic monster stood between me and being accepted as a Shinigami. I’d traveled across the world to become someone, not to turn into an ice sculpture that decorated a Yokai’s backyard.

I closed my fist and looked out the mouth of the cave, where Yuki Onna lurked around the tree line. Her long white kimono dragged behind her, torn from snagging on rocks and ice crystals. How could we smother her with fire so severely that even when the time freeze ended she’d be halfway to a puddle and unable to recover?

I turned away from Neven, coughing out a few more ice crystals. My gaze fell on the wide sleeves of Hiro’s coat, dragging in the slush of the cave floor.

I had an idea.

“Give me your coat,” I said, sitting up straight.

Hiro looked at me oddly, but slid his coat off.

“I like to think I’m chivalrous, but I believe my core temperature runs higher than yours and I’m less adapted to this climate than you,” he said.

“You won’t die,” I said. “Neven, yours, too.”

“What are you planning?” Neven said, taking his coat off anyway.

I ignored him for the moment, putting on both of their coats and kneeling before the remaining lantern. I extinguished it with a wave, then crushed the glass bulb between my hands, shaking the shards out of my palms.

“Ren?” Neven said.

I peered down at the pool of kerosene at the bottom of the first lantern, then tipped it over onto myself, dripping the fuel all along my sleeves and chest.

“Ren,” Neven said, “how—”

“We need to burn her quickly,” I said. “This way, I can hold her down even after the time freeze ends. I’m strong enough.”

“How can you know that?” Neven said, eyes wide.

“I know,” I said. I knew it because I wouldn’t let her, or anyone, take away my chance of being a Shinigami.

“She’ll just extinguish you!” Neven said.

“No,” I said. “Didn’t you see? She didn’t put the lantern out, she put herself out.”

“That doesn’t mean she can’t,” Hiro said.

I sighed. “Either we try something or we wait for her to come find us. It’s not as if we can go back with her lurking out there.” I turned to Neven. “How long can you hold your clock before your hand freezes off?”

Neven looked down at the chain hanging from his pocket. He poked it and hissed at the cold. “I don’t know,” he said, the words watery.

“Hey,” I said, grabbing his jaw and forcing him to look at me. “I need thirty seconds.” I probably needed more than that, but I didn’t want to scare Neven with an impossible task. “Can you do that for me? Will you help me?”

It was a cheap trick, to always ask for Neven’s help when he started to fall apart, but it worked. He straightened up, wiping his nose.

“Okay,” he said.

“Hold his hand closed if you have to,” I said to Hiro in Japanese. “Until she looks like she won’t fight back.”

He nodded, his lips pressed tightly together as if he had a great many things to say but knew better than to vocalize them.

I pulled a cord from my wrist and used it to knot my hair back to keep it out of the flames, then carefully pulled my clock’s chain with my long sleeve, tucking my clock back in my pocket. “Stop time once my clothes catch fire,” I said to Neven. I knew it would calm him down to have a cue, and I didn’t exactly trust his timing when he would be peering through the darkness of the cave through glasses that hadn’t been cleaned in months. “I need every second of the time freeze you can spare to melt her. But don’t wait too long, or she’ll shove an icicle down my throat again.”

“Ren,” Neven said, grabbing my sleeve. His fingers curled tight around the fabric, stiff and trembling from the cold. His lips pulled into an uneasy grimace in the dim light, eyes swirling a murky brew of navy and olive.

Over the near-century that we’d spent together, I’d learned how to hear all of Neven’s unsaid words. We never said sentimental things, because that wasn’t the way of soul collectors, who were meant to be dispassionate. But we both knew what was real and true, and that some unsaid things could never be captured by words.

I knew, for instance, that I couldn’t die trying to destroy Yuki Onna, because I couldn’t leave Neven alone in a world he didn’t understand with a Shinigami he didn’t trust. The resolve spread warmth through my bones and made me stand up straighter.

“I can do this, Neven,” I said. “As long as you hold the time freeze, she can’t hurt me, okay?”

He swallowed, then closed his eyes and nodded. “I’ll hold on. I promise, Ren.”