The Turncoat's Gambit

by Andrea Cremer

  “Who are you?” One of the guards stepped in front of Linnet. Without hesitation, she dipped her hand into her bodice. Her stiletto flashed, and a crimson line appeared on the guard’s throat before he could raise his weapon.

  The second guard’s eyes bulged as he watched his companion stagger, clutching at his neck while blood spurted through his fingers. When Linnet grabbed the petrified guard’s rifle, he barely seemed to notice.

  Charlotte drew her pistol, leveling its barrel at his head. “Open the door.”

  The guard fumbled with the key, but managed to unlock the door. Once they were inside the passageway, Charlotte nodded at Linnet, who slammed the butt of the rifle into the back of the guard’s head. He slumped to the floor.

  Charlotte ran down the passage, bursting into the laboratory. She found a scene eerily similar to the one she’d witnessed when she’d first been taken to this place.

  Grave was still splayed on the table. His body dissected and laid open to the world. Tinker Miller stood beside him. He held a scalpel, but his hand trembled.

  “You will stop working only when I tell you to stop working!” The barked command came from Lieutenant Redding, who glared at the quailing man.

  Redding whipped around to face Charlotte. “What’s the— You!”

  “Yes,” Charlotte said, smoothly cocking her pistol. “Me.”

  She shot her in the head.

  Lieutenant Redding fell to the ground.

  Miller dropped to the floor as well. He wrapped his arms around his knees, rocking back and forth as he wept.

  Charlotte’s companions rushed into the room.

  Linnet drew a hissing breath when she saw Grave. “Athene’s mercy.”

  Io pushed Linnet aside and strode matter-of-factly to the table. She turned to look at the others with a smile. “Not dismembered!”

  Ignoring Io for the moment, Charlotte hurried past her and leaned over Grave’s face. His eyes were open, but he was staring at the ceiling.

  “Grave?” Fear tinged Charlotte’s voice.

  He blinked, then his distant gaze focused on her. “Charlotte.” He smiled.

  “Are you . . . all right?” The question seemed ridiculous under the circumstances, but Grave understood Charlotte’s concern.

  “Yes,” he said. “I think my body is sound, but I had discovered that while Tinker Miller was . . . working . . . it was more pleasant for me if I could go away.”

  “You mean in your mind?” Charlotte asked.

  “Yes.”

  She wanted to ask where his mind could go, but there wasn’t time to ponder such mysteries.

  Io, Birch, and Pip hovered over Grave’s mutilated body. His rib cage had been cracked, and his body cavity further opened. More flaps of skin were stretched out and pinned down like insect specimens. Pip’s face had lost some of its color, but she inspected Grave without flinching.

  “Fascinating,” Io murmured.

  “Aunt Io?” Grave turned his gaze toward her. “Why are you here?”

  “To put you back together!” Io reached out to touch his cheek in a gesture of warmth that surprised Charlotte. “You’re not in pain, are you?”

  “No.” Grave said. “But I don’t like this. I don’t like how I feel. I don’t like not being able to move.”

  “Of course you don’t,” Io replied. “Who would?”

  She turned her attention to Birch and Pip. “Now. Hand me the tools that I ask for, and when I need your assistance, do exactly as I say.”

  Deciding it best that she get out of Io’s way, Charlotte said to Grave, “You’re in good hands. I’ll be right over there.”

  Grave nodded. It was a strangely normal movement, given that his head was one of the only parts of his body still intact.

  She smiled at him and began to turn away.

  “I knew you would come, Charlotte.”

  Her throat closed, and tears gathered in her eyes. He’d been here so long. Alone. She didn’t deserve such faith.

  “I’m so sorry, Grave,” she whispered.

  “I’m not,” Grave told her. “Don’t be sad.”

  Charlotte nodded, trying to hold back her tears.

  “Now, Grave,” Io said, “we’re going to begin. I want you to tell me if anything feels wrong. It won’t do any good for us to put you back together incorrectly.”

  “I’ll tell you,” Grave answered.

  Charlotte made her way to Linnet, who was standing over Tinker Miller. The man was still shivering and rocking.

  “What should we do with him?” Linnet asked.

  “Nothing,” Charlotte said. When she looked at Miller, all Charlotte felt was pity. “He didn’t want to do this.”

  Linnet shrugged. “If you say so.”

  The pair watched as Io and her assistants worked painstakingly to restore Grave’s body. Most of the procedures Io performed herself, though she occasionally called upon Birch or Pip, or both, to aid her. What Charlotte found the most fascinating were the moments when Io summoned Scoff to her side. At her bidding, Scoff would produce a vial or a flask or a pouch and administer the substances inside as Io directed. Some were thick and viscous; others, shimmering and light as dust motes. Some required precise and minimal application, while others were spread liberally over Grave’s torso.

  “Alchemy?” Linnet whispered to Charlotte. Her expression was as mesmerized as Charlotte’s.

  Charlotte could only nod.

  An hour passed. Then another.

  Io was bent over Grave’s chest, stitching his skin back into place with metallic thread, when the building shuddered. In the distance, Charlotte heard a boom. The building shuddered again.

  “I’ll be right back,” Linnet said, and disappeared into the passageway.

  Casting a glance at Charlotte, Io said, “Only a bit longer.”

  Charlotte bit her lip and nodded.

  More ominous sounds, closer ones, reached into the laboratory.

  Linnet returned. “The French fleet is here. We have to leave.”

  Her warning was marked by an explosion that made the building not only shudder, but rock. The cart covered with surgical tools tipped over, its contents clattering onto the floor.

  “Just a few minutes more.” Io gritted her teeth in concentration.

  Charlotte’s nails dug into her palms. Linnet paced beside the door.

  The frequency of blasts increased. Charlotte heard the roar of large engines, signaling the arrival of heavy-gunned warships.

  “There!” Io stood up. “Scoff. The ointment.”

  Scoff dipped his hand into a jar and rubbed shiny, silver paste over the stitches in Grave’s chest and abdomen.

  “Silly me,” Io huffed. “You’re still shackled to the table. Linnet?”

  Linnet started toward the table, but Grave said, “There’s no need.”

  He sat up. The steel cuffs that had bolted his arms to the table sprung loose as if they were paper, as did the collar at his neck.

  Io nodded with pleasure, then beamed at Birch, Pip, and Scoff. “You see? We did an excellent job. Well done!”

  Though Io seemed to be taking all of this in stride, the rest of the group were staring at Grave in amazement.

  Grave swung his legs over the side of the table and hopped down. He bent his knees and stretched his arms.

  “This is much better.”

  “I’m delighted,” Io said. She snapped her fingers at the dumbfounded group. “Get a move on. We don’t want to be blown to bits, now, do we?”

  32.

  WHATEVER ORDER HAD existed when Charlotte and her companions entered the warehouse had vanished with the arrival of the French fleet. The air docks burned, and the platform shook as the bombardment continued.

  They ran for the trolley.

  “Everyone in the first t
wo cars,” Linnet ordered. She pulled Charlotte into the front car with her. “The automated settings will get us killed. We’ll never make it off the platform without more speed.” Linnet leaned down and pried a compartment open with her stiletto to reveal a control box filled with buttons and levers. She punched three buttons and pulled hard on the largest of the levers.

  “Manual controls engaged,” the tinny voice of the trolley announced.

  Linnet grasped what Charlotte had thought was an emergency brake.

  “That’s the control?” Charlotte tried to mask the alarm in her voice.

  With a grimace, Linnet said, “It’s the emergency brake, but when you activate manual control, it also becomes the accelerator. That’s all we can do, speed up and slow down.”

  Linnet shoved the brake forward, and the trolley lurched on the tracks.

  “Hang on!” Linnet shouted to the passengers in the second car.

  The trolley hurtled forward, screeching along the rails as it was forced from the leisurely pace for which it had been built into breakneck speed.

  Charlotte was about to tell Linnet to slow down, but when she turned, she caught sight of what was happening to the platform behind them. The largest of the warships had crossed into firing range of the city. Their fury now rained down on the highest platforms. The Governor’s Platform, the pinnacle of New York, was in flames, and its turbines were beginning to fail. Unable to maintain equilibrium, the platform was slowly tilting away from its horizontal plane toward a vertical position. At the same time, it was falling. In minutes it would collide with the Military Platform.

  “Go faster, Linnet,” Charlotte breathed, though she doubted the other girl could hear her or that the trolley wasn’t already being pushed to its limit.

  The tracks angled down as they crossed the threshold from the Military Platform and descended onto the Market Platform. The incline gave the trolley more speed. The cars began to quiver.

  An explosion rocked the Military Platform, its impact shuddering down the tracks. The cars jolted sideways. Charlotte felt the right side wheels lift off the tracks. Pip screamed. The trolley thudded back onto its rails as the track began to level out and, at the same time, to curve.

  Linnet swore. “We’re going to hit this turn too fast.”

  She hauled back on the brake, shouting, “Brace yourselves!”

  Sparks flew as the wheels shrieked in protest. The trolley entered the curve. They were slowing. Slowing. But the momentum of their descent pulled the cars too far into the turn. The trolley surged to the left. A horrible jolt threw Charlotte back against her seat and then they were floating as the wheels jumped the tracks. The cars were airborne for only seconds before the platform rushed up to meet them. Charlotte gripped the side of the car as tightly as she could, but the impact of the crash wrenched her from her seat. Her body slammed into Linnet’s. The car was falling, and Charlotte’s world was spinning. She hit the ground hard. All the air rushed out of her lungs. Her body had stopped moving, but she could still hear people screaming and metal crumpling.

  Charlotte sucked in a painful breath, forcing her lungs to work. She wheezed, then took another breath as she pushed herself onto her hands and knees. There was pain, but the bruised sort. She could put weight on her hands and her feet. Her muscles responded when she told them to move. She was dizzy, and she put her hands on her temples, waiting for the wooziness to fade.

  When she trusted herself not to fall, Charlotte stumbled forward, moving toward the jumble of smoke and gilded metal that had at last come to a stop in Temple Square. Charlotte couldn’t believe how far she’d been thrown from the wreck, but then the cars had probably kept moving after she’d fallen free.

  “Charlotte!”

  She turned to her right. Linnet was running toward her. A gash ran from her temple to her jaw, but she appeared otherwise unhurt.

  “Are you hurt?” Linnet asked, her eyes tracking over Charlotte’s form.

  Charlotte shook her head. When she spoke, her voice was a croak. “The others?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Together they approached the wreckage. The trolley cars lay on their left side.

  “Birch!” Linnet called. “Scoff! Pip!”

  They had to climb up the roof of the trolley so they could peer inside the second car.

  Birch was lying prone toward the rear of the car, while Scoff’s body was splayed between the first and second cars. Charlotte couldn’t see Grave, Io, or Pip.

  “Birch!” Linnet shouted.

  Birch groaned.

  “Thank Athene.” Linnet lowered herself into the car.

  Charlotte was about to do the same when a deafening crash wrenched her head around.

  Having shaken off the disorientation of the crash, Charlotte could now perceive the Governor’s Platform clearly. She watched with horror as structures, vehicles, and the small, forsaken bodies that were people slid from its surface. This chaos of projectiles struck the Military Platform, which in turn began to buckle. Its sides slowly lifted, curving inward as the Governor’s Platform crushed its center.

  “Linnet!” Charlotte didn’t have to explain.

  “We have to get them out.” Linnet put one of Birch’s arms over her shoulder and helped him to his feet.

  Charlotte braced her legs over the side of the car and reached down. “Hurry!”

  Birch grasped Charlotte’s wrists as she gripped his. With all her strength, Charlotte pulled him up, levering the weight of her lower body against the car. When Birch’s torso cleared the trolley window, he was able to push himself the rest of the way.

  “Can you help?” Charlotte asked.

  “I think so,” Birch said. He took the same position as Charlotte and leaned over the car.

  Linnet had Scoff on his feet. One of Scoff’s arms was dangling at an impossible angle.

  “I’m going to have him stand on my shoulders, so you can grab his chest,” Linnet called to them. “We don’t want to damage his arm any further.”

  Birch nodded. Linnet dropped to one knee and braced her arms against a seat. Scoff climbed onto Linnet’s shoulders, using his good arm to steady himself by finding handholds in the interior of the car.

  “Okay, Scoff,” Linnet said. “I’m going to stand. Steady now. Steady.”

  “I’m all right,” Scoff told her, but his face had gone white with pain.

  With a sharp groan, Linnet pushed herself up. Scoff’s head rose, then his shoulders cleared the window.

  “We’ve got him,” Charlotte called as Birch wrapped his arms about Scoff.

  “What about the others?” Charlotte asked Linnet. “Do you see any of them in the front car?”

  “They’re not here.” Linnet frowned. “They must have been thrown from the car like we were.”

  But they hadn’t returned to the wreckage. That meant they weren’t conscious, or . . .

  “I’m coming out.”

  Charlotte started to reach for Linnet, but the other girl had crouched low. Her body burst into motion like a spring uncoiling. She grabbed the frame of the window and pulled herself out. Linnet paused to look at the crashing platforms above them.

  “Let’s find the others.”

  “Charlotte!” Birch was calling from in front of the first car. “Here!”

  They hurried toward the sound of his voice and found him crouched beside the crumpled car. Pip was sitting there crying. She didn’t appear to be hurt, but she couldn’t stop weeping.

  Charlotte went to her. “Pip, are you wounded? Can you move?”

  “He saved me,” Pip breathed through her sobs. “He held me till it was over.”

  Pip had been thrown from the front of the trolley. Charlotte tracked the path from where the girl was sitting farther into the square until she saw Grave. He was standing over a body.

  “Oh no.”
Charlotte ran. She knelt beside Io’s unmoving form. The woman’s eyes were closed. A trickle of blood seeped from one corner of her mouth.

  “I couldn’t shield them both,” Grave said. “I’m not big enough.”

  “You protected Pip.” Charlotte laid her ear against Io’s chest. Hoping for the faintest heartbeat, the shallowest breath. But there was only silence.

  A sob welled in Charlotte’s throat, but she swallowed it. “You saved Pip,” she said to Grave.

  Grave stared at Io, his face etched with a sadness Charlotte had never seen in him.

  “Aunt Io?” Birch had reached them. “Oh no. Aunt Io! No.” Birch dropped to his knees. He grabbed Io’s hand and pressed it to his cheek. “No. No. No.”

  Pip and Scoff hovered nearby.

  “I’m so sorry, Birch,” Pip cried. “I’m so sorry.”

  Birch was shaking his head.

  “We can’t stay here.” Linnet spoke quietly. “The city is falling. We don’t have much longer.”

  “I don’t want to leave her,” Birch said. “She doesn’t belong here.”

  “Grave can carry her.” Linnet nodded at Grave. “We’ll bring her home.”

  That seemed to give Birch enough strength to stand up. Grave gathered Io in his arms.

  “We should run,” Linnet said.

  With what little strength they had left, they ran toward the docks of the Market Platform. They could only hope that the docks were still intact and that Jack was waiting for them at the Scarab. Charlotte had to shut out the horror that surrounded them. Everywhere people wailed and screamed. The air had a metallic bite that Charlotte knew was the saturation of panic. But to think about it, to let in the devastation of so many lives, was to give up. She wouldn’t get off the platform alive if she stopped for even a moment to consider what was happening to everyone and anyone who lived in New York.

  Smoke thickened as they closed in on the docks. Shops serving the trading vessels that frequented the platform were ablaze. The air stabbed at Charlotte’s lungs, making her cough, and her eyes watered.