by Kim Cleary
"We wait. Owen wants this over too." I hope I hadn't misread him. "He will talk."
Seconds dragged by and slowly turned into minutes. Fatigue spread from my head down my body until my knees buckled. Glynn pressed close to me. He pocketed his gun and gripped his hands around my elbows. I was vaguely aware of Simon's presence, shoulders slumped, defeated. I called Liliwen again, and felt her presence as if she'd raised her palm to silence me.
"How long will this take?" Glynn stroked his hands from my elbows to my shoulders and rested them there. "You're exhausted. You shouldn't have tried healing this burn."
"I'm fine."
His touch lifted the hairs on my neck and I found myself leaning into his strong chest. We'd barely spent any time alone together since I got here. We'd stumbled from one catastrophe to another with hardly a word that mattered.
"We didn’t get that early night in Del’s guest room, did we?" I nuzzled into his chest.
He stroked his hands up my arm and touched his lips to my temple.
With a loud sigh Liliwen reappeared.
"He's not happy, but he said okay." Liliwen's words floated into my head. "Buckley and yourself. That's it, no one else."
She didn't wait for a response from me. I twisted away from Glynn.
"Simon." I choked back the desire to touch Glynn, to hold him close for a long time. We'd make this work. There would be time together later. "Where is the start of the line that leads to Saltpetre Way? Do we need to drag the cart to it?"
Steps shuffled behind us. Glynn grabbed the torch and swung the beam of light back to the bay.
"Yes, we need the cart," Simon said. "I'll show you the way."
"You'll come with us, won't you?"
"He will." Colonel Asher's voice echoed across the room. "Keep your hands where I can see them Buckley."
Chapter 25
"How the hell." Glynn held his empty hands at waist height. A green light on the end of Asher's gun reflected an eerie light over his face.
My legs buckled and the last of my strength drained from my limbs.
"Put your weapon on the bench and move away." Asher gestured with the gun. "You two have been in cahoots all along I see."
Glynn pulled me behind him and pushed his gun along the bench. "You followed us."
"Obviously. You losing your touch Buckley? Did you really expect us not to watch you two? Your detour to Dr. Prescott. Nasty lumps on two men’s heads. And as for your witch friend, she is quite a find."
Glynn stepped toward Asher. "Let her go."
"No way. She'll do as she's told with you in chains Buckley. Trust me, my boys won't be as gentle next time."
A green light flicked on either side of Asher. A uniformed man stood at each light, both with guns like his own. Glynn and I were unarmed. My heart sank to my stomach. Everything was about to be undone.
Simon stiffened at the sound of the colonel's voice, but his steps didn’t waver. "Six of us won't fit."
"Then find two of the damn things," Asher shouted.
The soldiers emptied Glynn's pockets.
I clutched my satchel to my body. "You already took the gun in my possession."
The man snatched the bag from me and rifled through it. He removed my athame, sniggered at the blunt edge, and smacked the bag back into my chest.
When Simon reached the cart, he lowered its small wheels to the ground. "There's two like this, each one needs two men to work the hand pump." Digging in his heels he thrust his weight against the end of the cart. It moved a couple of inches at most. Even with wheels, it would be hard to push all the way across the cavern.
"Get behind these things, push them where they need to go." Asher pointed with the barrel of his gun. Let's all take a trip to this Saltpetre Way." Asher rolled his tongue around the town's name, as if knowing it gave him power over it.
Hand in hand Glynn and I paced to the cart where Simon labored.
"Not you, witch," Asher shouted. "You get over here with me. I'll put a bullet in her if you so much as falter Buckley. As for you, witch, try anything and I’ll put a bullet in your major so fast you won't finish your first abracadabra."
Working together Glynn and Simon shoved the cart forward. Asher prodded me to follow, and stepped directly behind me. Every step, the end of the gun prodded my back.
The two soldiers manhandled the second cart behind us, inch by gratingly painful inch. After what seemed like an eternity, Simon yelled stop. Asher moved ahead of us. He kept the gun pointed at me while he shone a small torch into the darkness.
"The track is down two levels. We descend in the elevator." Simon struggled to catch his breath. "It will take two trips."
He trudged to a huge metal cage and yanked the heavy grill doors open. He and Glynn maneuvered the cart into the cage while Asher watched.
Asher signaled for me to squash in one corner while squeezing in the opposite corner himself.
"Close and latch the grill," Simon said. "It won't move until it's latched."
Asher turned a metal bar until it locked into place. At the back of the elevator, Simon and Glynn heaved on a thick chain. With slow jerking motions, we descended until we hit the ground level with a crunch of metal against metal.
Asher unlocked the doors. He pulled the grill to one side. "Girl, get your half of the door open."
I struggled with the metal door, but finally pushed it wide enough to get the cart through. Limbs trembling, I crashed onto my knees as Simon and Glynn pushed the cart through the metal gates.
Glynn wrapped his arms around my waist and lifted me upright. "How much further?"
"The start of the line is close." Simon's voice wavered as much as my legs.
Asher flashed his gun's green light across the ground.
"There it is." Simon darted to the back of the cart and shouldered it in the direction of the track.
Glynn joined him and both men wriggled the cart to the start of the offshoot track.
Asher prodded Simon in the stomach. "Get back up and bring my men down here with the other cart."
Simon hesitated, then saluted. Please be out of habit. We needed Simon on our side. He disappeared into the darkness.
"Keep your hands where I can see them." Asher pushed me to the ground at his feet. He kept the rifle pointed at Glynn. "Neither of you try anything. I might not kill both of you, but I guarantee I will kill one of you."
On the ground, a fine dust coated my hands and filled my nose. If I could catch my breath, rest for a while, I could try and grab a gun. Then what? Against three with guns?
The strengthening spell must be spoken aloud, but Asher would never let me get to the end. Even if I found a way to cast it, a second spell so close to the first would have unforeseen consequences, and the crash when it came would be sudden and ugly.
The lift rumbled back down. The soldiers cursed as they manhandled the heavy handcart out of the lift to join us. Desperately, I searched my memory for options.
"Meagan, with me in the first cart. Buckley and the other one, in the second cart." Asher pointed at the two soldiers. "You two split up, one in each cart. One of you is gonna have to do some work."
It would take two to move each vehicle. He wouldn't put the gun down, so he expected me to pump the cart with one of the soldiers.
Glynn must have realized at the same time. He marched to Asher and thumped him in the shoulder. "She can hardly stand. You can't expect her to work the hand pump."
Asher clicked the trigger safety off and pointed the gun at my legs. "I want her alive. But she doesn't need all her body parts. Get back and shut your mouth."
If I used every ounce of energy to physically move the cart, I’d have nothing left to turn the table on Asher and his two soldiers. How on earth was I going to get us out of this mess?
Asher pushed me onto the first cart and climbed into the seat at the back. Simon latched the wheels into place so the cart rolled smoothly into the track lines.
"Up ahead, it merges with two
others." Simon still breathed heavily. "They run parallel for a way, then at the major intersection, they split into different directions."
Asher clanged his gun against the metal. "Do your dead people thing girl, and do it damn quick."
I remembered the map spread across the metal table in Echo Den, the train line followed the ley line all the way to Saltpetre Way. "I can find it."
"Meagan." Simon tapped my left foot. "At the front here, a lever switches from one track to another." He shoved my foot hard left as if to make a point.
"I've got it." I reached down and squeezed his shoulder. Neither Asher nor the other soldiers saw anything.
"Get pumping, people." Asher sounded the happiest I'd heard him.
Once we got a rhythm going, we moved quite quickly through a large and flat tunnel.
Now that I knew how to recognize it, the ley line glimmered like one of the well-lit paths in the protected suburbs, and the track followed it in a straight line. At the intersection, the ley line and the train track to Saltpetre Way veered hard right together.
We weren’t going there. I thrust the lever and moved us hard left. On the map, it curved around and up north. Away from where Asher wanted to be. No idea where it led, but it wasn’t anywhere near Saltpetre Way.
The soldier opposite me grunted. The green light from Asher's gun highlighted beads of sweat streaming down his face, but he clutched the handle firmly. Shortly after the intersection, the tunnel narrowed and the ground inclined slowly but steadily upwards.
"How long will this take?" Asher’s foot tapped a rapid beat.
Up ahead a dim gray light grew larger. It looked like the sun hadn't burned through the clouds yet. Bring on the light. No matter how hot it was outside, I'd experienced enough suffocating tunnels to last me a lifetime. The steady climb had my muscles burning. Nothing but sheer willpower kept me going.
Asher was the only one of us not gasping for breath and grunting with exertion. He sat at the back of the cart like Attila the Hun going into battle
Simon gasped just as much as the rest of us, sweated the same. But he felt different in a way that mattered to him. Twice I’d promised to help him die, properly dead. If we survived, and I couldn’t persuade him otherwise. A sense of futility hollowed out my body. No matter what it cost me, he deserved for me to honor the commitment I made.
The heat increased as we neared the tunnel exit, but at least the track leveled out. Both carts slowed as we caught our breath in daylight again. Simon wiped sweat from his eyes with the back of his hand. He caught me staring at him. He gave me a small wave, quickly disguised as a rub across his brow.
Asher shouted at us to keep moving. I unfolded the cap Glynn shoved in my pocket and jammed it on my head. Asher smirked at me. I smirked back. I wasn't beaten yet, and if blood pumped through my veins, there was no way I'd let him torture Glynn, or Simon, or use me to command the dead in his vile experiments.
Somehow, I had to kill him.
Chapter 26
We’d left the tunnels far behind us. I lost track of time. The soldier opposite did all the work. Sweat rolled down my face and neck. The uniform stuck to my body. My arms trembled so much it was hard to control them. With my hands sticky with sweat and dirt, I fought to hold on. Thank Haebeth for the clouds. At least I only suffered with heat not the burning rays of the sun.
Bundling my pain and exhaustion into weapons earlier was a masterstroke of luck born of necessity. My shoulder was stiff but not throbbing. My ankle no longer twanged. The cut in my head had healed. Poor Glynn was not so lucky, his head must’ve throbbed painfully, his fatigue must’ve ached as heavy as mine.
At some point, we’d arrive at the end of this line and Asher would realize we weren’t in Saltpetre Way.
I still didn't have a plan. He'd be livid. Probably fly off the handle. He'd balk at killing me because I knew where Owen was. If he killed Glynn he'd have nothing to dangle over my head to force me to cooperate. But there was a lot he could do that stopped short of killing us.
In the distance, a train station appeared. We started climbing again, this time steeply and curving steadily to the left.
At the train station, I collapsed over the hand pump, exhausted. The metal poked me painfully in the ribs but I lay there, everything trembling while sweat stung my eyes and my head throbbed from dehydration.
"Get on with it, witch." Asher prodded me with the end of his gun.
"She needs water," Glynn called out.
The second cart holding Glynn and Simon stopped directly behind us. I couldn't move except to crumple to the floor. Paralyzed with powerlessness, every breath took extreme concentration.
Asher smashed his foot against the back of the cart. He cursed and stood, scanned the horizon. "We're heading back to the city. Where are you taking us? I promised you a bullet if you were a bad witch."
"You need her." Glynn's voice was the calmest I'd ever heard it.
"We've had this discussion," Asher said. "She doesn't need her leg. Doesn't need her arms either."
"You need her to pump the cart. Let's rest, find some water."
Asher pulled a pair of handcuffs from his vest. "Once she's told me the correct direction, I'll manhandle this thing."
"If you hit a vein, she will bleed out. That's not what you want, is it?" Glynn spoke with authority and urgency.
Glynn’s tone triggered a response in me. The slightest flutter stirred in my belly. Maybe we could take advantage of this stop. I pushed myself onto my knees, grabbed the pump handle, and tried to pull myself upright. Asher would shoot me if he thought he could hurt me without killing me. I didn't doubt it.
"You know me better than that, Buckley. A bullet in her sexy butt will hurt like hell but it sure won't kill her." Asher aimed the gun at me again. "This is your last chance, witch. You can either stand up and pump the cart to where your undead friends are hiding, or I’ll shoot you now." He leaned toward me as if to emphasize the threat. "You will tell me how to get there while you scream in pain."
What now? I could take us to the middle track. But how close was it to Saltpetre Way? I'd have to trust when we got there, and Asher realized I still hadn't taken him to the correct place, Glynn would stop him. I wobbled to my feet with coarse breaths shaking my chest and gripped onto the handle with reserves of strength I didn't know I possessed. I rubbed my stinging eyes. Asher still glowered at me, a vicious coldness in his stare.
I started at a sudden movement behind us.
Simon grappled with the soldier in his cart and knocked him off-balance. Leaping across the small gap he jumped next to me. I crashed into the soldier opposite. We all crumpled to the floor. Asher fired, and Simon's body jerked with a thud of bullet into flesh. Asher bared his teeth and roared. He swung his arm wildly, fired repeatedly into the station. My ears rang from the deafening noise. All I knew was the booming pain in my ears, Simon's cold body on top of me, and my sticky blood-coated hands.
Simon wanted to die, but surely not like this.
I wriggled Simon's body off me. He lay on a bottle of water. The world spun slowly around me. Dear Haebeth, he’d died to bring me water. I grabbed it and gulped it down before anyone could take it off me.
Dear Simon. I cradled his head in my lap. Tears welled, and one dropped from my chin to his face.
Asher casually reloaded a new magazine. Seventeen cartridges clicked into place with slow methodical precision. In the cart behind us, Glynn punched the soldier in the chest. They wrestled with one another until Glynn landed a punch on the man's head. Glynn grabbed the soldier’s gun as his body fell in a heap.
Asher aimed at the second cart. Bullets pinged against its metal front. I wrapped my hands around my ears, but the noise still deafened me. I drooped over Simon’s body, too exhausted to pull in death power to help. We were too far from the ley line for it to help me. It must only have been seconds since Simon died, but time slowed to a crawl.
Glynn grabbed the semi-conscious soldier, twisted his arms
behind his back, and used him as a human shield as he leapt from the cart. Asher fired into the soldier's body as if he was at target practice. I tried to ignore the ringing in my ears, tried to pull in energy from the dead men. I knew I was hyperventilating, but I couldn’t stop myself.
Glynn ducked around the cart, all the time firing back at Asher. Bits of rust zoomed into the air then drifted back down. Bullets embedded themselves in the wooden frame. A splinter hit me in the face and I tasted blood. The soldier opposite me wobbled to his feet and raised his gun to shoot. Glynn fired at him. The man grunted as a bullet smashed into his neck. His gun dropped to the floor with a clatter. My nostrils reeked with the smell of blood and death.
Death energy swirled in my belly. It wouldn't last long. I had to use it as best I could. My muscles tightened in readiness, I pushed Simon's body out of the way. As I stood, Asher and Glynn pointed guns at one another as if they thought they were the stars at an Old West shoot out.
This couldn’t be happening.
My ears still buzzed, my heart pounded hard against my chest. Asher grinned like a maniac.
They both fired at one another.
Glynn tripped backward. He stumbled a few steps, crashed to his knees, and toppled over.
He lay on his back, completely still on the gravel between the tracks.
Chapter 27
I clutched my arms around myself as pressure built in my chest, until I gasped for breath. Someone screamed like a banshee. Not someone—it was me.
I'd lost him, just like I feared I would.
The agony of losing him ripped a hole in my heart.
Asher laughed. He laughed so hard his eyes filled with tears.
He glanced back at me and bellowed. "Just you and me, witch. Let’s make sure of it."
He scrubbed the tears from his eyes and aimed the gun at Glynn again.
No time for sobbing. No time for magic. Too weak to take advantage of the death energy swirling around me. I grabbed the handgun from the floor and clenched the muscles in my thighs to steady myself. I aimed at the center of Asher's back where I thought his heart would be, and pulled the trigger.