Dead Iron

by Devon Monk

Mr. Shunt’s lips split in a blackened grin filled with serrated teeth. He squeezed the trigger.

  The impact threw Cedar backward. The bullet dug deep through his lung, taking the breath out of him and leaving behind pain. He landed hard, blacked out, and came to again, barely able to hold on to conscious thought. The bullet was still moving, digging through him like a beetle burrowing between his bones.

  Cedar howled, anger and rage colliding in his mind and bringing him to his feet.

  Mr. Shunt was gone. Shard LeFel and Mae were gone, locked up tight in the car.

  He heard the middle train car door open. Water hissed over hot coals, and chains clattered from inside the car. Mr. Shunt must have been releasing the matics and tickers to protect the rail.

  Cedar started toward the railcar, each step agony. He had to stop Mr. Shunt. He had to save Wil, Elbert, and Mae.

  The night air punctured with the inhuman cry of rage and twisting metal that was coming up the track.

  Cedar limped to the shadows near the train car, as half a dozen metal beasts, some as large as a bison, others small as fox, lumbered out of that car, puffing white and black plumes of steam into the air.

  They were made of steel, iron, leather, wood, brass. They were made for pounding, tearing, cutting, stabbing, breaking. They were made to kill.

  “Kill the Madders,” Mr. Shunt commanded from where he stood on the platform by the car door. “And every living thing with them.” The menagerie of matics ran, rolled, pounded down the rail, along the rail, running fast toward whatever bellowing creature was coming this way.

  And then Mr. Shunt strode through the car to the last in line. Cedar pushed himself to follow, still clinging to the shadows. The bullet hadn’t exited his body. It rubbed and dug with every movement, every breath. But pain meant nothing.

  Kill, the beast within him urged. Kill the Strange.

  Behind Cedar in the car that held his brother, the child, and Mae, something moved. If he took the time to hunt Mr. Shunt, Shard LeFel might kill Wil, Elbert, and the beautiful Mae Lindson.

  Cedar Hunt was not a man who hesitated in making decisions. And yet he paused, torn between the choice of killing or saving, the mind of man and the urge of beast locked in stalemate.

  A gunshot rang out, breaking through his thoughts. He glanced over at the rail where bullets pinged and sparked and rattled off the matics, peppering the metal monsters to no effect.

  The Madder brothers’ laughter filled the silence between the shots, their guns roaring like cannon blasts, each concussion illuminating the night and clouds of smoke from their guns with flashes of lightning and fire. Over all that, he heard Rose Small call his name.

  “Cedar Hunt!”

  Cedar saw her, amber hair stirring wild from beneath a bonnet, goggles over her eyes reflecting the spark and fire of the gun in her hands. A gun she fired at the matics, and the railmen who had roused out of their tents, and come running down the line to face the demons in the night.

  “Find Mae!” Rose yelled, her aim taking three shots in a man’s heart at seven hundred yards. “Save Mae Lindson!”

  She was calm as a sharpshooter, taking careful aim at a matic’s head. She shot out an eye, then reloaded and aimed at a valve line as the ground shook.

  “Find Mae!” Rose Small shouted again.

  Mae. Cedar knew where she was—in the train car. With Shard LeFel. With Wil and Elbert.

  Mr. Shunt was nowhere to be seen.

  But down the track, walking forward as if dragging a mountain behind him, was a man.

  Big, dark, bloody, and charred, Jeb Lindson walked down the railway, two huge chains strapped to his wrists. On those chains were two round matics taller than the man himself, screeching and squealing as he dragged their dead metal husks over the rail. Every step loosened bolts, pried spikes and ties, and forced the rail to rise up like a giant, twisted snake behind him, broken free of the earth, broken free of the binds that held it down.

  Smoke rose up from the rail. And the tick, tick of blood and sweat falling off the big man’s fists sent a pockmark of plumes up off the metal like two tiny engines following behind his steps.

  The wind shifted and brought Cedar new scents. And he knew that man, that creature, tearing apart the rails was not alive, nor was he dead. He did not know what could power a man to keep moving, keep walking, pounding forward.

  Jeb yelled out, a single call of pain, anger, and longing wrapped around one word: “Mae!”

  Cedar’s heart beat painfully, his blood too hot, his wounds agony as he ran. To find Mae. To save Mae. To get to Mae before Jeb Lindson.

  No, to save his brother. To save the child. Yes, and to save Mae.

  Cedar leaped up onto the platform of the middle train car where the door hung open. He needed into the first car, and that door was shut.

  The door slammed open.

  Mr. Shunt stood in the threshold, oil pouring slick from his empty sleeve. Mr. Shard LeFel and Mae Lindson stood behind him.

  Cedar snarled. He leaped.

  Mr. Shunt raised his remaining hand from within his coat, and fired the gun again.

  The world tipped sideways, filled with explosions and noise. And all Cedar could do was fight to breathe as waves of pain crashed through him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Shard LeFel tightened his grip on the Holder he held tight to his chest as if it were a babe made of glass. In his other hand was a spiked chain looped around the witch’s neck. The same chain noosed the necks of the wolf and the boy.

  “Well done, Mr. Shunt,” Shard LeFel said, watching the other wolf twitch and bleed at his feet.

  Mr. Shunt bowed slightly, and then bent toward the wolf who struggled to breathe. He splayed his spiked fingers, itching to dig out the wolf’s heart.

  “Leave him,” Shard LeFel said. “He will be dead soon. I’ll not have this interruption stop my return.”

  Mr. Shunt hissed, then seemed to compose himself. He straightened. “Yes, Lord LeFel.”

  Shard LeFel handed the chain to Mr. Shunt and walked through the open door into the car his collection of matics had once filled. Empty now. But he could hear them out on the battlefield, the magnificent screech and hiss and thump of the devices killing the Madders. Music. Sweet and fitting for his last grand night in this mortal world. Fitting to send him back to his own lands and immortality.

  An explosion rang out and then a ragged howl of a voice lifted above it: “Mae!”

  Shard LeFel paused between one step and the next. “Could it be?” He glanced over his shoulder at the witch, whose eyes were wide in fear, her voice silenced by the leather gag in her mouth and the barbed-wire chain that left beads of blood around her throat every time she swallowed.

  “I believe that is your husband, Mrs. Lindson, come back from the grave. Such a pity he is too late to save you.”

  He continued through that car and to the next. The door opened before him and one of the Strangework bowed, and stepped aside to allow his entrance.

  Shard LeFel strolled over to the center of the room, where the door lay like a coffin on a pedestal.

  “Three hundred years of exile,” he said softly. “And now, finally, I shall cheat this death, cheat this mortal world, and mete my revenge upon my brother in the lands from whence I came.”

  He placed the Holder at the very top of the door’s frame, pressing it down into a hollow carved perfectly for the device. The device pulsed, moonlight caught there in echo to a faintly beating heart. But Shard LeFel knew it would take more than moonlight to open this door.

  It would take three lives.

  The three Strange against the walls shifted, a slight moan escaping their lips as the Holder found its place in the door. Each of the Strange was attached to the door by wires and tubes that ran from its neck, wrists, and feet and fed into the door.

  Shard LeFel meant to savor his moment. A decanter of threehundred-year-old wine and a crystal goblet awaited his celebration.

  “Mr. Shunt
, see that our guests are comfortable,” LeFel said. “Then open the sky for me.”

  Mr. Shunt gave the witch’s chain to the first Strange who clung to the wall at his left. The wolf’s chain he gave to the Strange at the far end of the car, and the boy’s chain he gave to the final Strange standing nearest Mr. Shard LeFel.

  Then Mr. Shunt walked across the floor to a crank set near the door. He turned the crank, and the ceiling of the train car drew aside like a curtain pushed back by a hand.

  Shard LeFel uncorked the wine and poured it into the decanter. “And unto this world, I bid my most final farewell.”

  Moonlight streamed thick and blue-white into the room, striking the Holder and the door. Light from the Holder poured flame into the runes and glyphs and symbols the Strange had carved into the doorway.

  And from outside the train car, bullets rattled the night.

  “Beautiful,” LeFel said. “And now all that is needed is the key.” He glanced at the boy who slept curled and chained at the Strange’s feet. He glanced at the wolf that panted in pain. He glanced at the witch who stood wide-eyed with fury, tears tracking her cheeks to wet the leather gag.

  “Mr. Shunt, begin with the boy, then the wolf, then the witch.”

  Mr. Shunt bowed, his eyes bright, his teeth carving a sharp smile. He walked to the Strangework who stood above the boy, and inserted one of his bladed fingers, like a key, into the Strange’s chest, where a heart should be. He twisted his hand, and the Strangework shuddered. Mr. Shunt withdrew his finger.

  The Strange changed.

  It spread its arms wide and the front of its body split open, revealing gears and sinew, pulleys, pistons, and bone that worked in dark concert to expose spikes and edges and blades lining every inch of it. A living, breathing iron maiden, remarkable in its ingenuity of both form and function.

  Mr. Shunt picked up the sleeping boy and deposited him deep inside the gears and spikes, pressing him back, but not far enough to prick his skin. Not yet.

  Then he moved to the wolf, who was too injured and too drugged to fight. Mr. Shunt shoveled him inside the spiked guts of the Strangework there.

  And lastly he walked to the witch.

  “I will not miss this wretched land.” LeFel sipped the wine, savoring the heat and flavor of ancient blooms across his tongue.

  “Nor will I mourn its destruction.” He sipped again, and pressed one of the jewels on the bent cane in his hand, releasing the pure silver blade cased within it. A blade that would carve out his brother’s heart.

  “Mr. Shunt,” LeFel said. “It is time to spill the blood of our coin.”

  Rose Small watched as Cedar Hunt ran, limping hard, to the train car where Mae must be trapped. She ducked behind the thin stand of trees, put her back to a fir trunk, and pushed her goggles out of the way as she reloaded.

  The Madders were still out there, standing in the open in front of the trees, firing off those blunderbusses and shotguns, shrouded in smoke and fire and moonlight, and laughing like wild jackals.

  The matics were coming. Five of the most amazing devices that would each have struck her dumb with awe if they weren’t so hellbent on killing her and the Madders. Rose chambered the bullets, her hands trembling, her heart pounding, then glanced out from behind the tree.

  The full moon set the devices into full contrast, even at a distance. She didn’t know how, but the matics were working in conjunction with one another. Through the smoke and blasts from the Madders’ guns she could see one of the doglike beasts was down and twitching, and the other stood stock-still, steam gushing up out of it like a geyser. But the others, the Goliath with steam-hammer arms, the battlewagon, and the huge, spiked wheel, were bearing down faster than the Madders could shoot them dead.

  And if that weren’t enough, the railmen from up a ways had come into the fight with more guns than an army. She like as not figured one of the train cars up the line had to be an arsenal of weapons.

  Rose swallowed hard and tasted the oil and burn of spent black powder. She didn’t reckon there was an easy way out of this alive.

  She fitted the goggles back over her eyes and fired cover shots at the hulking Goliath that hammered an arm down so near the Madders, one of the brothers fell flat from the impact. The big beast reared back, screeching and clacking. It was recharging, ratcheting up its firing device to slam its arms down again.

  Rose shot at the thing, aiming for what she prayed were vulnerabilities: tubes, connecting valves, and gauges.

  But the matic did not slow. It rolled this way on strange tracked feet that chewed over the terrain as if it were riding on rails.

  The Madders used her fire as a chance to run back behind the screen of trees with her.

  “Do you have a plan, Mr. Madder?” she yelled to Alun as he skidded to a stop behind the tree to her right, both his brothers half a tick behind him, grinning and breathing hard

  Bullets zipped through the night air. Needles and dirt sprayed down around them.

  Rose leaned out again and fired off the last of her shots at the railmen, who were holding ground behind the metal monsters.

  “Plan to kill the matics and crack LeFel out of his fortress,” Alun said. “Reload, Miss Small. The boys are going to need cover.”

  Rose was already reloading. She glanced up at the Madders. Bryn and Cadoc were gone.

  Just then the rapid fire of what sounded like a hundred guns tore flashes of light through the night.

  “That’s the battlewagon,” Alun yelled over the peppering recoil of bullets. “Figure it has a twenty-five- or thirty-shot cartridge.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his pipe, then sparked a wick with a tiny striker, and puffed until the tobacco caught.

  Rose’s heart beat harder than a hammer. She’d heard tales of the rapid-fire guns used in the war, but she had never seen such a device, and didn’t want to become intimately acquainted with one now.

  “That one’s done,” Alun yelled into the sudden pause of gunshot.

  “Fire, Miss Small.” He clamped his teeth down on the pipe stem and leaned out from behind the cover of the tree. He sent off a volley of bullets. The battlewagon had extinguished its cartridge and must be reloading. But how much time would that take?

  Rose Small shouldered her shotgun and aimed back at the field. The battlewagon was indeed reloading, but the hulking Goliath rumbled toward them on its tracks, hammer arms pulled back and ready to tear down the trees they stood behind. Rose took aim at the Goliath, but nothing seemed to stop it.

  “Look low,” Alun yelled.

  Rose lowered her rifle.

  Another matic, the huge spiked wheel, was rolling their way, rattling over dips and tree stumps, one hundred yards and closing fast.

  Rose fired everything she had at it. So did Alun. But they didn’t have nearly enough firepower to stop that thing.

  Alun was no longer laughing. He was cussing up a lung. He pulled something from his pocket and lit the wick of it with his pipe, then lobbed it at the rolling matic.

  A ground-shaking explosion rang out, but the wheel kept coming.

  Rose was out of bullets. She pulled her handgun and stood her ground, setting off shot after shot at the spiked wheel. Bullets didn’t stop it. Bullets didn’t even slow it.

  Fifty feet out. Thirty. Twenty.

  Rose turned to run.

  And in front of her rose a monster out of nightmare.

  Mr. Jeb Lindson.

  Rose froze and stared into the eyes of a dead man.

  “Move!” Alun hollered.

  Rose threw herself to the side.

  Jeb yelled.

  Just as the spiked wheel bashed through the trees. Limbs cracked and crashed to the ground with skull-splitting impact.

  Rose tucked up tight behind a boulder and covered her head with her arms. She peeked out just in time to see the wheel come to a crashing stop in front of Jeb Lindson, the forward-most spike pulling back like a cannon ready to fire.

  With inhuman strength
, Jeb Lindson swung the huge round tickers attached to the chain around his wrists. He slammed them into the matic. Metal met metal, crashing and sparking. Steam gushed into the air as the wheel matic faltered under the blow. Jeb didn’t wait for it to fall. He lifted the giant chain and ball and smashed it into the matic again, busting seams, popping rivets. The wheel matic exploded, hot scrap and ash raining down out of the air.

  Then the big man went walking. Toward the rail. Toward Mr. Shard LeFel’s train cars, where his wife, Mae Lindson, was held captive.

  Rose smelled hair burning and patted at her shoulders. Her hair was on fire! She pulled at the base of her braid, dragging her hair forward over her shoulder. A very bad mistake. The fire licked up the side of her cheek. Rose yelled and slapped at the fire, blistering her palms. She snuffed it out just before it reached her ear, and sat there, for a second or two, trying to get back her breath and her courage.

  The night filled with bullets again. The battlewagon was rolling closer, firing another deadly round off into the night.

  Blinking back tears of pain, and swallowing down her fear, Rose scrambled for her gun and prayed she had enough bullets in her pockets to end this.

  Mae Lindson had no weapon except her magic. It would take her voice to curse or bind, or draw upon magic of any kind. And she had no voice.

  Jeb yelled out in agony. He was alive, trying to find her. Trying to save her. But that monster Shard LeFel was right. He was too late. There was no time left.

  Time.

  Alun Madder had given her a pocket watch. She knew it carried a speck of glim. Could she use it as a weapon?

  As Mr. Shunt turned his back to stuff Elbert inside the gory clockwork of the Strange, Mae worked to get the pocket watch out of her coat. They had bound her hands together in front of her, but she could still move them.

  The Strange that held the chain around her throat was hypnotized by Mr. Shunt’s work. If it noticed what she was doing, one hard tug on her chain would crush her neck.

  Mae fingered the watch into her hand, then slowly pulled it up to her mouth. She tugged at the leather gag, but it wouldn’t move. Over the top of the pocket watch she whispered, more song than word, more breath than voice, calling on magic, begging magic to come to her, hoping the glim would work as an amplifier, a cupped hand, a bullhorn, to call the magic and make it stronger. She begged magic to not so much break a curse but interrupt it and hold it away for one single minute, for one single man: Cedar Hunt. And then she pressed down the watch stem, stopping the watch, and stopping Cedar Hunt’s curse, for just one minute.