Inside, Nemo was slumped at the controls. A rogue bullet had found its mark before Sloan shut the door when the fight first started.
Marcus ran forward and cradled the small man. He was already gone.
Sloan looked out of the front of the mage engine in sheer horror. Less than a mile away was the camp of workers continuing to lay track. Tiny figures pointed and shouted at the mage engine to stop. They waved their hands in the air and ran in every direction.
“Marcus, let him go. He’s gone. We have bigger problems to worry about.”
“The brakes.” Marcus looked out the window and grasped their situation in a heartbeat “There has to be a lever here somewhere to stop this thing.”
Sloan looked at the steel conductor’s panel full of brown knobs and levers. It would take much more time than they had to figure out what exactly each handle did.
“Screw it,” Sloan reached for every handle and every lever she could find.
Her hands flew over the instrument panel, twisting, turning, and pulling every knob, lever, or switch she could get her hands around. It was as she pulled down on one particularly large lever that they felt the locomotive shudder and squeal as it slowed in pace ever so slightly.
“That one!” Marcus yelled., “That’s the brake!”
The locomotive was practically shaking off the track. Sloan guessed they were going twice as fast as any sprinting horse. The tent-like area in front of them was now yards away.
Men still flailed their arms, shouting for them to stop and running to get clear of the hurtling steel monster.
Sloan placed both hands on the lever and pulled down with all her might. Throwing her back into the effort made the force she put into the pull twice as harsh. A shrill squeal filled the air. Smoke and steam from the overworked locomotive filled the inside of the mage cart. Sloan pressed the lever down further. Sparks filled the air outside as the locomotive began to slow.
“It’s working!” Marcus yelled.
Sloan smiled to herself and gave the lever another harsh push. The brown lever gave under the pressure.
Sloan fell backwards, the broken lever in her hand as the locomotive lurched forward and continued to gain speed. She regained her feet just in time to see the end of the track and say one last thing to Marcus.
“Ooooops.”
The locomotive blew through the workers’ camp, sending track equipment, wood, and metal bars flying in a hundred different directions. The hurtling ton of steel, man’s greatest invention to date, flew off the track and into the desert at mind-numbing speed. The carts twisted and contorted like a withering snake and finally came to a rest.
Jack
Jack was listening to the lullaby again. He could hear her voice so clearly. He couldn’t see her, still her voice was enough. The soothing way she spoke made him want to dream forever.
“Jack! Jack, are you all right?”
Jack was ripped from his happy memory and brought back to his harsh reality. There was sand everywhere; in his mouth, in his hair, even in his boots and gloves. He blinked as he struggled to sit up. The sun beat down on him with no sympathy. He squinted as he saw Aareth beside him.
“Rough landing, but it could have been a lot worse, right?”
Jack nodded, getting a good look at their surroundings. Desert greeted him in every direction. The locomotive tracks were to his left and stretched out in front of him in both directions as far as he could see. “At this rate, I think we’ve done as much damage to ourselves as to the bad guys.”
Aareth offered Jack his right hand that still wore the gauntlet.
Jack reached out and hesitated at the last minute.
“Don’t worry, they’re powered off now. I’m starting to get used to them. I’ll get better with the gauntlets. I just need more practice. Are you all right? Anything broken?”
Aareth helped him to his feet as Jack looked down at himself and stretched. His head hurt and there was a ringing in his ears. Aside from a few bruises and scratches, he was fine. “I feel like I’ve been fried and thrown from a mage-powered machine traveling at a ridiculous speed, other than that, I think I’m going to make it.”
“Good. And look at this our luck is already changing. I found this in the sand while I was searching for you.” Aareth reached behind him and pulled out Jack’s new wand from his belt.
“How about our friend?” Jack accepted the wand. “Did we—did we kill him?”
“I haven’t seen his body yet.” Aareth shook his jacket and a shower of sand fell to the ground. “I don’t expect to.”
“Listen,” Jack shook sand from his hair. “You just zapped me and got us both thrown off of a locomotive, and that’s all right, I can handle that. What I can’t handle is being lied to. I know you’re not telling me everything.”
Jack was reminded that if his father was correct, he was talking to an assassin. He didn’t care anymore. He needed to get to the truth.
“All right.” Aareth shook out his own long black hair and wrapped it in a ponytail behind him. “Let’s walk back and see if any of those mage-powered bicycles are working. I’ll tell you whatever you want.”
Jack fell in step with Aareth. The two followed the tracks backwards in search of a means of transportation.
“So, what do you want to know?”
Jack had so many questions he wasn’t sure where to begin.
“Why did that man call you ‘Ghost’? You knew him, didn’t you? And how did he move so fast? Why were you really chosen to come on this trip? Are you—are you an assassin?”
“That’s a lot of ground to cover.” Aareth took a deep breath and looked deep into Jack’s eyes. “I’ll tell you, but you have to promise that this stays between you and me. I trust you and your father. There’s something about the captain that just doesn’t add up.”
“You think Sloan’s on the other side of all this? That she had the locomotive hijacked?”
“No,” Aareth shook his head as he studied the horizon in front of them. “I don’t think that she was part of the attack that took place just now. I do think she’s hiding something.”
Jack took a minute to think about Aareth’s words. I thought we were just going to track an animal for the queen. Who knows what we’ve gotten ourselves into now.
“Six years ago, when I was a few years younger than you, Jack, I joined New Hope’s department of justice. I had a respectable job and I was good at it. I even got married.”
Aareth paused and Jack could tell he was choosing his words. It seemed Aareth hadn’t spoken to anyone about this in a very long time and he wasn’t even sure how much he wanted to say.
“I showed so much promise as an officer that I was promoted to the level of inspector. This was when the queen was really cracking down on the corruption inside the city. I was given an assignment to go undercover and infiltrate one of the toughest gangs in New Hope. Well, long story short, I succeeded but in the process they found out who I really was, beat me within an inch of my life, and killed my wife. It’s ironic really—they didn’t kill my body but I still died that day. The best part of me died that day.”
Jack didn’t know what to say. Half of him wanted to console Aareth. He just didn’t know how. Even if he did he wasn’t sure if Aareth even wanted to be consoled.
“I know that it’s not the same,” Jack avoided making eye contact. “But I lost my mom when I was still a baby. I was born in New Hope. My father doesn’t talk about it much. There was a break in, my father wasn’t home. They robbed us, and shot my mother.”
Both men avoided making eye contact now. Instead they continued to walk in the direction the locomotive had traveled, towards New Hope.
“Now I’m reminded why I don’t talk about this kind of stuff, “Aareth sighed. “Anyway, I went off the deep end. For these last three years I have been an assassin for hire to the richest men and women in the Outland. The man who attacked us on the train is another assassin I’ve run into in the past. I don’t know his real
name, but he’s known as The Scar.”
“Creative.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“And you’re The Ghost?”
“Not a nickname I would have chosen for myself. But when I do go on assignments, I prefer to do things quickly and quietly.”
Jack nodded. He knew he should be scared that he was in the presence of a trained killer, but he wasn’t. Maybe it was the way Aareth talked about his past, about the wife he once loved. Whatever it was, Jack could tell that Aareth wasn’t past saving.
“Why did the queen choose you to come with us?” Jack asked.
“It was Edison.” Aareth smiled at the thought of the inventor. “He was my boss when I worked for the justice department in New Hope. I guess he still saw something in me. He’s never lost hope over the years. When he offered me this chance to get my life back on track, I took it.”
“So you’re done being an assassin?”
“For three years I’ve tried to fill the hole that she left when they killed her. I’ve ended more men’s lives than I can count and drank more bottles than I can remember. But the hole only gets wider Jack. Killing, drinking, they’re just temporary fixes. I’m hoping that something changes while I’m on this mission. That there still might be some hope for me. Honestly I don’t know. Maybe it’s too late.”
Jack struggled with the right words to say. He was surprised Aareth revealed so much. But something told him deep down Aareth wanted to talk to someone. That this conversation was as beneficial for Jack as it was to him.
“My father says every day we decide what interpretations of ourselves to be. That there are many types of people we can be in the future and every day we take steps towards who we are going to become.”
“Is that why you didn’t shoot Scar when he was coming at you?”
Jack bit his lip as he remembered the man charging him on top of the locomotive. “I—I’ve never killed a man before.”
“How old are you, Jack?”
“Just turned eighteen.”
“I’m twenty-four, killed my first man when I was your age. There will come a time when killing one man will save either your life or the lives of the ones you care about. When that time comes, you can’t hesitate.”
Jack didn’t have anything to say. He knew Aareth was right; however, the way he was raised was completely different. His father was a peaceful man, and even when it came to tracking, he preferred to run off paranormal creatures or even relocate them when he could.
Jack still had questions for Aareth about their attackers and who he thought they were, but it seemed like the time for questions was over.
“Do you see what I see?” Aareth raised a finger and pointed toward the setting sun.
Jack had to squint as his eyes fought through the sun’s setting rays and focused on the desert terrain. Then he saw them, two bulky bicycles sticking up from the sandy floor.
Sloan
It was the shouting that woke her. Men were yelling and running outside of her steel coffin. Sloan opened her eyes slowly, wincing at the horrible pain shooting through her right arm and head.
She was laying against the cold steel of the mage engine cart. The cart was lying on its right side. Sloan looked up through the opening on the left side at the darkening sky outside.
“Hello? Hello? Is anyone in there?”
“I’m here!” Sloan shouted as she fought to stand. A wave of dizziness attacked her. She wobbled on her feet. Sloan steadied herself and took a long, deep breath. She looked around the dark interior of the steam engine. Marcus was nowhere to be seen.
A head she recognized popped over the edge of the cart door. The foreman that was hired for the job of laying the track looked at Sloan with an open mouth.
“Captain Sloan! Don’t worry, ma’am, we’ll get you out of there in no time. Are you hurt?”
Sloan looked at her bloody right arm and hand. She gently touched her left temple with the fingers on her left hand. Her fingers came back sticky with thick, crimson red. “I’ll live, Christopher. I can climb out.”
“We’re bringing a rope now, ma’am. Maybe you should wa—”
Sloan was already searching for foot and handholds in the steel structure. In another minute, she was up and waved away the helping hand Christopher offered. Standing next to him on the toppled mage engine, she had a better view of what damage the runaway locomotive caused.
The machine had obliterated everything in its way. All five carts were strewn across the desert floor in a zig zag pattern. The locomotive’s final resting place was a few yards away from where the track came to an end.
“There were three men with me, two with brown hair and one with long black hair. Have they been found? How long have I lain unconscious?
“Not long, Captain Sloan, maybe a few minutes. My men are searching for survivors now. What—what happened to the locomotive?”
“We were attacked.”
“Attacked?” The foreman looked up at her, wide eyed and worried. “By who?”
“I don’t know. There will be plenty of time to figure things out later. What’s most important now is that we search for survivors.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Christopher bobbed his bald head. He took in Sloan’s cuts and bruises with wide eyes. “We should really get those wounds taken care of, though.”
“Later, I’m fine. I’ve had worse.” Sloan cocked her head and narrowed her eyes as she heard shouts. Two men ran towards the locomotive with a figure supported between them. Sloan jumped from the locomotive and ran to meet them.
Marcus was slumped between the two workers, his body limp, his face covered in blood. The workers tried to do half salutes still carrying their load as Sloan approached.
“Is he all right?” Sloan voiced the question she knew she had to ask although she was unsure she wanted the answer.
“Unconscious, ma’am, and he’s lost a lot of blood,” one of the workers said.
“Take him inside a tent and have the medic tend to him right away.”
The men nodded and were off again towards the encampment’s tents. Sloan put Marcus and his well being out of her mind. There was nothing she could do for him now.
She wiped the blood coming down from her own head on the back of her sleeve. Sloan began searching the other carts for Jack and Aareth.
After an hour of searching with Christopher and his crew members, all they found in and around the locomotive were the bodies of their attackers and the locomotive’s driver. Six bodies were laid out together and positioned under a sheet. Nemo’s limp corpse was counted separate and placed to the side out of respect.
Sloan bit her lip and walked toward the medic tent to see how Marcus was faring with the foreman at her side.
“What should we do first, Captain? I mean, do we continue with the track?” Christopher was rattling off questions so fast it came out like one long sentence. “Get the locomotive salvaged and restored? Send a messenger to inform the Queen?”
“Things are getting a bit complicated, Christopher. Something is going on and it bothers me that it’s happening now. Is there someone here you would trust with your life to take a message to Queen Eleanor?”
Christopher thought for a moment and nodded.
“Are we in any danger here, Captain?”
“I think we are all in a very great deal of danger, Foreman. Send a messenger and instruct him that he is to talk to the queen and only the queen. He is to tell her what happened here. Tell her that I have gone on to Burrow Den and on my recommendation, ask that a regiment of soldiers under Lieutenant Baker be sent here to guard the track while it is being laid.”
A wide-eyed Christopher nodded and turned to fulfill his orders.
“Oh, and Christopher, in the meantime, right the locomotive. Get it back on the steel rails and keep laying the track. Whoever this is, we aren’t going to let them intimidate us. If they want a fight, then we’ll give them a fight.”
Christopher nodded again and left as Sloan ent
ered the traveling city of tents that followed the working men as they laid the track. All the tents were brown, most of them were deserted. All but a few of the men still searched for bodies among the wreckage of the locomotive.
One of the tall brown tents sported a crimson red cross. Sloan ducked as she entered. It was dark now, and inside candles were lit to fight back the night. A doctor sat by a conscious Marcus. Both men looked at Sloan as she walked in.
“You’re awake, sorcerer, that’s a good sign.”
“I would have to agree,” Marcus gave Sloan a tired smile. The doctor finished wrapping his head with a white bandage. “Just a scrape and a minor concussion. Have you found Jack and Aareth?”
“Not yet but we will. They probably saw what was going to happen and jumped off the locomotive in time. There are men out searching for them now. I just wanted to come in and check on you before I go out myself to help with the search effort.”
“I’m going with you.” Marcus pointed to the dried blood on her head and the fresh blood that still ran down her right arm and fingers. “Before we go, you need to get looked at.”
“I’m fine, there’s not time.”
Marcus looked over his shoulder at the elderly doctor who still sat by the bed. “Doc, may we have a moment, please?”
The doctor stood up, and left the tent with a bow.
“Sloan, you need medical attention. Stop acting like you’re invincible. It’ll only take a few minutes for the doctor to stop the bleeding and disinfect your wounds.”
“I told you, I’m fine.” Sloan wasn’t used to being questioned. The only thing holding her tongue back now was the degree of genuine concern she saw in Marcus’ eyes. “Your son and Aareth are still out there. Let’s go find them.”
Sloan turned to go, her blonde hair flying behind her. After a few steps, she realized Marcus wasn’t following.”
“You don’t have to prove anything to anyone, Sloan. All the men respect you and know you’re tougher than any one of them.”
House of Wolves: (A Paranormal Urban Fantasy) (The Vampire Project Book 1) Page 8