‘That might be worth something,’ Lord Guantes said thoughtfully. ‘Oh, do stop whimpering and tie your hand up, Sterrington. But I’d need more.’
‘You’ve given sufficient provocation for war,’ Irene said bitterly. Unless I can persuade Kai’s family that his safe return is sufficient to keep the peace … ‘You’ve chased me out of Venice. And you exposed a Librarian spy who was trying to infiltrate the Fae, if you want to put it that way. And you can easily say we’re too petty to waste time pursuing, or alternatively take the credit for making us flee. Your choice.’
‘And what vow do you want us to swear?’ Lady Guantes demanded. She took a step towards Irene, both hands empty now, her eyes on the knife in Irene’s hand.
Irene knew it could undo everything she’d worked for if she didn’t get this right. If the wording allowed for any wiggle-room, it was the Fae way to take it. ‘I want you both to swear that you permit us - myself, Vale and Kai -‘ she gestured at them as she spoke, ‘to leave this place here and now, in safety, without let or hindrance by you or others under your command or allied to you, by action or inaction, to return in safety to the world from which Kai was kidnapped.’ At which point she would hustle Kai, and Vale too if necessary, through the nearest Library entrance. They might have to spend the next few years undercover or visiting other worlds, but they’d be alive.
‘That is quite a thorough undertaking, Miss Winters,’ Lord Guantes said. He took a step back to stand beside Sterrington, glancing down at the woman’s ruined hand. ‘Hmm. And what would you pledge in return?’
‘To leave this place without taking any further action against you and yours,’ Irene said. ‘And I and my two allies here would undertake not to seek revenge against you, by action or inaction.’ Kai wouldn’t like it, but he’d owe her. However, what his family did would be their own business. Irene hoped they’d keep the Guantes running scared for the next few centuries.
‘No offers of service?’ Lady Guantes suggested.
‘Absolutely not,’ Irene said. ‘Mr prior oaths to the Library forbid it.’
‘Do you speak for the Library?’ Lord Guantes asked. ‘You seem to be negotiating on your own behalf here, Miss Winters. I’m surprised to hear you make such sweeping suggestions without any real authority. What would your superiors say?’
Irene felt the pressure of his will again, and knew he’d found a weakness. She was here on her own. She had run off to rescue Kai without orders. If she came to a private deal with them, on top of her bargain with the Train, would she be in even further trouble when she returned - if she escaped at all …
She pulled herself back from the brink of self-doubt. ‘Garbage!’ she said crisply. ‘That is complete and utter garbage. I know my superiors don’t want a war, and that’s what it all comes down to. Make all the insinuations you like. But understand that here and now, I speak for the Library.’
The words hummed in the air of the carriage like a high-tension wire in a thunderstorm. And she waited for the Language to punish her for her lies, but the words held true. Both the Guantes flinched, and even Sterrington, distracted by her pain, curled in on herself.
‘The bargain is still grossly in your favour,’ Lord Guantes said, his aura of power too close for comfort. Irene deliberately glanced away from him, to Lady Guantes, who was also uncomfortably near. ‘But maybe we can negotiate. With a player like you on the other side, one might even consider long-term arrangements—’
‘It will do,’ Lady Guantes said, cutting him off. She took a deep breath. ‘My love, we must do what we can, with the options available. I recommend taking Miss Winters’ deal.’
‘Perhaps …’ Lord Guantes began.
And then Sterrington moaned in pure agony. Irene glanced at her automatically - and saw that Lord Guantes had leaned down to grind his thumb into Sterrington’s mangled hand. That was when Lady Guantes made her move. The woman slammed into Irene, covering the space between them faster than Irene would have thought possible. She knocked Irene to the ground, pinning her there with her body weight. Irene fought to keep a grip on her knife as Lady Guantes stretched across her, but was viciously elbowed in the stomach and struggled just to breathe. Then Lady Guantes slammed her head against the floor, effectively gagging her with a forearm across her mouth. Her left hand held Irene’s right wrist down, keeping the knife out of play.
Irene bit down and tasted Lady Guantes’ blood.
Lady Guantes grimaced, her face barely a foot away, triumph flaring in her eyes as she pushed down harder. ‘Stop wasting your time, Miss Winters. You’re no better than everyone else - all too easily distracted. My love, could you please come and knock her out?’
Irene bit down harder and brought her left hand up, wrenching at Lady Guantes’ right arm. But the other woman had the advantage in strength, weight and leverage. Irene could hear Lord Guantes’ unhurried steps as he approached, above Sterrington’s moaning. She struggled furiously, but she just couldn’t loosen the other woman’s grip. Then Lord Guantes stood above her, choosing his moment. Irene tried to jerk her head sideways, to free her face so that she could speak, but Lady Guantes held her pinned.
But at the edge of Irene’s vision Vale moved, jack-knifing his legs around to slam sideways into Lord Guantes, rolling with the motion to put his weight into it. Lord Guantes fell forward with an indignant grunt, slumping against Lady Guantes and Irene. Lady Guantes pitched off-balance, and Irene managed to wrench her head to one side. Blood from Lady Guantes’ arm ran from her mouth, and Irene spat it out as she screamed, ‘Fae, get off me!’
The words came without thinking, from a place of fury and terror, but they worked. The Language caught the Guantes and flung them both off Irene - knocking them away, to leave her sprawled on the carpet, trying to get her breath. She saw Vale struggling to his knees, having somehow manoeuvred his bound hands in front of him, but Kai was still unconscious. Irene’s hand tightened on the hilt of her knife as she pushed herself to her knees. Then Lord Guantes was suddenly in front of her and had her by the throat. He gripped her neck where the chain had attempted to strangle her, its marks still raw, and dragged her to her feet, forcing Irene’s head back so that she had to meet his eyes, but she couldn’t get a word out. And she couldn’t get any breath in. She could feel her pulse hammering in her brain, rattling faster than the Train’s wheels - as his gaze held her like a pin spearing a butterfly. He had all the power now.
Yet she still had a knife.
Irene brought it up and forward, not fighting the grip on her throat, but moving into it instead. It was a sharp knife, a good one, and she slid it up and into Lord Guantes’ chest, under the ribs and towards the heart. It was as if someone had drawn her a chart to follow. It was the way this particular fairytale ended.
His grip loosened and she fell forward again, every breath painful. She heard Lady Guantes screaming, but it was merely a background to her own panting for air.
Then Vale was beside her. She could see the bindings on his wrists. A spark of common sense brought her back to herself, and she rasped painfully, ‘Bindings, leave the wrists and ankles of Vale and Kai.’
Lady Guantes was kneeling on the bloodied floor, cradling her husband in her arms. His eyes were closed and he wasn’t moving, the hilt of the knife still protruding from his chest. It looked as if it shouldn’t be there. Undignified. Somehow human.
Irene rose to her feet, with Vale supporting her. She wanted to disclaim responsibility, say I tried to offer him a deal, but she couldn’t deny the reality of the scene before her. She had blood on her neck from Lord Guantes’ glove, and blood on her hand from her own fatal blow. She could feel it, wet and sticky.
Lady Guantes slowly rested her husband’s head on the floor and eased his right glove from his hand, folding it and tucking it into her bodice. Tears ran down her face, but she was too calm - calm enough to make Irene’s stomach clench in revulsion. ‘I’m not going to fight and get myself killed,’ she said. ‘But this is not over.�
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Irene wanted to say something that would somehow ease those tears and that dreadful calm and stop a private vendetta. But even the Language wasn’t enough. ‘Leave,’ she said. ‘We won’t stop you.’
Lady Guantes nodded. She rose to her feet. ‘Sterrington?’
‘Ah, no, madam.’ Sterrington was crouched in the seat at the back of the compartment, looking incapable of action either for or against anyone. ‘I regret I must withdraw my service. This game is too rich for my tastes.’
Lady Guantes nodded. ‘Au revoir, then. Miss Winters. Mr Vale. Dragon.’ She stepped across to the door, her gloved hand on the handle. ‘I won’t bother setting my guards on you. There seems little point now, and I’d rather leave you to far more lethal pursuers. And they’ll be upon you very soon.’ She smiled then, and it was chilling. ‘If you survive them, then we will certainly meet again.’
‘Door bolt, open,’ Irene said. The last thing she wanted was to keep Lady Guantes in the carriage.
Lady Guantes stepped out into the corridor, closing the door behind her.
‘Are we pursued?’ Vale demanded.
‘Yes,’ Irene said shortly, ‘by the Rider - and multiple other Fae. They must be almost upon us now.’ She felt suddenly exhausted, her resources almost gone. She remembered the other person in the room. ‘Sterrington, are you a danger to us?’
Sterrington was clutching her wrist again, trying to stop the trickle of blood. ‘I’m scarcely your friend,’ she said. Irene could see her struggle to remain civil. ‘But I’m not going to hold a grudge because I involved myself in someone else’s affairs.’
Irene nodded. ‘Then we’d better just hope the Train gets us to our world before it’s too late.’
‘We’ve reached the disputed spheres,’ Sterrington offered weakly. ‘You might do better to jump from the Train - flee by foot. They know you’re here, after all.’
‘Winters?’ Vale questioned.
Irene shook her head. ‘They were close enough for me to see them. So if we jump now, they’d notice us. We’d never make it.’
‘Ah well,’ Sterrington said.
There seemed nothing to say to that, and Irene lowered her head wearily. Her whole body ached.
There wasn’t any noise from the corridor outside. Lady Guantes must have taken her guards with her. There was just the hammering of the Train. She was out of ideas. There was only hope left.
Sterrington’s words jogged a memory. ‘The disputed spheres?’ she asked, raising her head again.
Sterrington nodded. ‘Those spheres that fully belong neither to us nor to the dragons. Both sides can act within these lands.’
Irene had sent one distress call. Perhaps it was time to shout once more, in case someone was listening. ‘Excuse me,’ she said and levered herself up from where she’d collapsed on a couch. ‘Just to make sure we’ve done our utmost.’
She limped towards the windows, bracing her hands against a frame. ‘Window, open,’ she said, her throat still sore and bruised. The window slid down in its frame, revealing the passing landscape. It was a windswept forest now, full of dark trees and blowing leaves. She wondered if their pursuers would look like a Wild Hunt, if she could see them now.
She focused her mind as her hands curled tightly around the window frame. ‘AO SHUN!‘ she shouted at the top of her voice into the night beyond. ‘DRAGON KING OF THE NORTHERN OCEAN!’
The Train shook with a noise like thunder as a greater darkness than night or forest came roaring down on the wind, great wings outswept as it circled the Train. It was a long torrent of shadow, with a black serpentine body and ebony wings. Pale eyes shone coldly even from that distance, and it hovered above the Train as it ran along its track between worlds. Behind the Train, their pursuers fell back, the figure in the lead slowing as the dragon spread his wings.
Sterrington stumbled to her feet to stare out, her face white and her eyes wide with shock - and Vale moved forward to put a supportive arm around Irene’s shoulders. She needed it.
Irene could barely hear her own voice. What was left of her strength was scraped empty, and only Vale’s arm kept her upright. But she managed, ‘I think we have safe escort.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The Train pulled into London with a screech and a shudder, just as it had arrived. Irene had watched through a window as people fled along the platforms, guards frantically waving flags. It was the pre-dawn rush and the pale sky was split with the first streaks of light, with the remains of the dying moon drifting in and out of the clouds.
Kai had recovered consciousness about half an hour before, but he moved and spoke like a man suffering from a bout of influenza - leaning forward as though his joints ached and constantly rubbing at his forehead. His skin was marked with bruises and red burn-like weals. Vale had filled him in on Lord Guantes’ fate. Kai had only nodded, but his eyes had become inhuman for that moment, savage and satisfied.
Irene herself had tried to sleep, but ironically she was too exhausted. The idea of a hot bath hung in the future like the promise of Christmas or a new book in a favourite series. She could imagine brandy, too. But first they needed safety.
The Train’s guiding shadow had left it ten minutes before London, when the landscape had dissolved from an unfamiliar urban cityscape into long shadowy fields, and then into the gasworks and factories that marked the outskirts of the city. Irene had seen those distant silver eyes again, as the long draconic form had pulled loose and lifted away, spreading vast wings that seemed to dissolve into rain-grey clouds at the edges. The future would contain an interview with a dragon king and she wasn’t looking forward to it, even if she had managed to save Kai.
‘I will be staying with the Train,’ Sterrington said. Vale and Irene had finally bound up her hand during the journey, and she held the bandaged limb protectively against her chest. ‘There’s nothing for me in this sphere.’
Irene nodded. No doubt Sterrington would be passing on the full details of what had happened to some other Fae, but for the moment Irene couldn’t bring herself to care.
Vale had opened the door onto the platform and London air flooded into the compartment, with all its smells of oil and humanity. ‘We should leave this conveyance while we still can,’ he said.
Irene followed Kai out of the compartment, with a final nod to Sterrington. ‘Thank you,’ she said to the Train as they left - not sure whether or not it was listening, but it had served them well in the end.
The Train blasted steam again and instantly began to move, its wheels shuddering against the rails as it slid out of the station.
Irene turned to look at Vale and Kai. They hadn’t vanished the moment she turned her back on them - and they were all alive and somehow in one piece. Then she noticed the stares in their direction. They were indeed battered, filthy and bloodstained. And a guard was approaching, looking scandalized at her shortened skirts, already opening his mouth to complain.
‘Yes, yes, quite,’ Vale said impatiently. He turned to Irene, effectively cutting the guard off mid-expostulation. ‘Winters, I suggest we take a cab.’
‘A wonderful idea,’ Irene said warmly, conscious of all the eyes upon them. ‘And we should use it to get Kai back to the Library at once.’
‘Oh, come now—’ Kai started.
Irene was suddenly furious. ‘Look. I don’t know how many other Fae know where you are. I don’t know what they might do. Until I do know, the Library is the only place I can keep you safe.’ She realized that she was shouting and lowered her voice. ‘Or do you have any other ideas?’
‘Perhaps I may be of assistance,’ said a familiar voice behind her.
Irene turned, readying herself to deliver a cutting retort.
But Li Ming was standing there. He - or she, Irene still wasn’t sure what the proper pronoun was - was impeccably attired for this world in silver-grey with a black tie. He gave a formal bow to Kai, and then a half-bow to Irene and Vale. ‘Your highness, I have a local transport waiti
ng outside and have arranged a place where you can attend upon my lord your uncle. There are matters of war to discuss.’
Kai drew himself up straight and returned a polite nod. ‘Thank you, Lord Li Ming. That is most kind of you. My friends, however—’
‘Naturally the offer of hospitality extends to all of you,’ Li Ming said. Irene wondered if their attendance was compulsory. The words matters of war were echoing in her head like thunder. No, no, no. She’d thought they were past that. Were she and Vale witnesses? Or was this invitation actually a sort of protective custody? But there didn’t seem to be any immediate threat to his words - or at least not a threat to them - or even the suggestion of official displeasure. ‘My lord your uncle would wish due courtesy to be given to your associates. Miss Winters and Mr Vale are very welcome.’
‘Thank you,’ Vale said. ‘You are most kind.’
Kai looked at Irene for approval. Putting the responsibility on me again, she thought acidly. When she gave him a half-nod, he turned back to Li Ming. ‘Then we shall be glad to accept,’ he said.
The cab trip was full of tension. Li Ming refused to discuss the question of Fae/dragon hostilities, claiming that it was a matter for Kai’s uncle, and instead questioned Kai about recent events. Vale brooded in the corner, from time to time sweeping Li Ming with that speculative gaze which suggested he was amassing data. Kai gave a cut-down version of what had happened, unconsciously rubbing at his bruises.
And Irene sat in the opposite corner from Vale and thought about war. Surely Ao Shun would be prepared to accept a peaceful solution? They’d rescued Kai. Or did some dragons want war just as much as certain Fae did?
If he did, then this world, and hundreds of others like it, might be doomed.
Li Ming had a suite reserved at the Savoy Hotel. The trusted lackeys of dragon kings presumably had big expense accounts, Irene thought grudgingly - she certainly couldn’t have afforded accommodation on this scale. The room was very pretty, though, all white and gilt, with a light-green carpet so spotless that it seemed a crime to walk on it. The heavy white velvet curtains were drawn back in swags from the window, and the morning light made the whole place far too bright. She, Vale and Kai were untidy blotches on its expensive elegance. Blotches with coffee, though, which helped.
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