With his free hand, Akstyr slammed the butt of the pistol into the dog’s head. He tucked his free leg up and kicked at the beast’s belly. The combined effort finally convinced it to let go. A fresh wave of agony washed over Akstyr, as more of his flesh was torn away when the dog fell. He forced himself to focus on the men again.
One was kicking at the fuse, trying to stomp out the flame before it reached the crevice. Akstyr lifted his pistol, struggling to aim while the twisting, swinging rope fought against him. No time for lining up a shot. He fired, and hoped.
The man stumbled backward, clutching his shoulder. His lantern dropped to the ground and went out. His comrade reached for him, arms outstretched, and Akstyr caught a glimpse of the back of the man’s hand. There, highlighted by the lantern light, was a brand. Akstyr couldn’t make out the details, but only gang members from Stumps had such marks emblazoned on their hands.
“Akstyr,” came Books’s voice from above. “Get out of there!”
Yes, right. Explosives. Akstyr tried to holster his pistol, fumbled it, and simply dropped it. He climbed as fast as he could, trying to ignore the injured leg.
A gun fired, and new pain ripped through him, searing his shoulder. Then a boom echoed through the mountains, and an ominous rumble welled up from below. A wave of force struck Akstyr like a battering ram.
All he could think of was to hang onto the rope with all of his strength as he flew through the air. Snow streaked sideways through his vision, and he lost track of whether he was facing up, down, or somewhere in between. The rope ran out of room to swing and snapped to a halt with a jerk that nearly tore his shoulders from their sockets.
One hand slipped from the rope, and he dangled helplessly by the other. He glimpsed tons and tons of rock sloughing into the ravine beneath him. Lest he join it, he flailed to recapture the rope with fingers gone numb from the cold. He finally got both hands back on it, but it was swinging back the other way. Akstyr cringed, anticipating another jerky stop, but the rope started rising. That motion quelled the fierce swaying. Up above, Books straddled the hatchway as he pulled the rope up. Weary and hurt, Akstyr simply hung on. The rocks were still shifting and falling below, throwing a cloud of dust into the air. The men were gone. If the railway tracks were still there, they were buried beneath rubble.
Even with Books’s help, Akstyr struggled to claw his way back into the engine room. As soon as he had the floor beneath him, he collapsed.
Books reached out a hand. “All you all right?”
“I got shot and bit,” Akstyr snarled, rejecting the help. “What do you think?”
Books pulled up the remaining rope, coiled it, and shut the hatch. “That if you can complain about it in complete, albeit grammatically questionable, sentences, you’ll be fine.”
Akstyr scarcely heard him. His mind was whirring at the revelation that those had been gang members. They hadn’t cared about the dirigible or the plan to close the pass; they’d just wanted him. They must have been trying to collect on his new bounty, but how could they have known he’d be up there?
It took a moment, and then realization came like a shot to the head. His mother. He’d mentioned to her where he’d be going. “Idiot,” he whispered to himself.
“What?” Books asked.
Akstyr growled and sat up to investigate his wounds. The shoulder stung, but the bullet had only grazed him. On the other hand, the dog bite was ragged and deep. He hoped it wouldn’t get infected. He didn’t have a good history of healing infections. He wasn’t even sure if he could concentrate well enough to heal normal cuts with pain distracting him. Another disgusted growl rumbled in his throat, and he flopped back onto the floor. “They were waiting for me, Books.”
“Yes, I apologize for not coming to your aid. I was in the navigation cabin, focusing on not bumping into that cliff, and I didn’t hear the gunshots at first. Who were they? Soldiers?”
“Not soldiers,” Akstyr said and debated whether to share more. Maybe he should pretend he had no idea who they were and what they’d been doing up there. Otherwise, he’d have to admit there was a bounty on his head and that he’d foolishly told his mother about some of the team’s plans. It’d be best to feign ignorance. Except he might need the group’s help to take care of the Madcats, especially now that it didn’t look like he’d be getting out of the city any time soon. “They were from the gangs, from the city. They were after me specifically.”
Books frowned. “Why?”
“The Madcats have a bounty on my head.”
“How would they know you were here? You didn’t tell anyone about our mission, did you?”
Akstyr’s lips twisted. “Just my mother.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh. All she wanted from the beginning was to get a piece of the money on my head. I’m a slagging fool for thinking…” Akstyr snorted, wishing he hadn’t asked those dumb questions about people changing. He’d let Books witness his naivete. “It doesn’t matter now. Pieces of that pass blew so high that they’ll be splashing down in the Gulf. Those boys won’t be trouble again.” Unfortunately, there were a lot of other people in that gang.
“Did you tell your mother any other details of our mission?” Books asked.
“No, I didn’t tell her details at all. I just said I’d either be at the pass or Forkingrust.”
Books frowned. “So, it’s possible she sent people here and to Forkingrust where the rest of the team is.”
“I didn’t say anything about Sicarius or the others.”
“I see. You’d only betray them to bounty hunters, not your mother.”
Akstyr’s leg was throbbing, and he was busy worrying about the Madcats, so it took him a moment to grasp what Books was talking about. A chill stampeded down his spine. Books knew what he’d done. Did the whole team know? “I…”
Books’s lips were pursed in disapproval. “Your bounty hunter buddy decided he’d rather have Sicarius on his good side than be on yours. He shared the tale of how you approached him.”
“I didn’t mean for it to make trouble,” Akstyr said. “I was just trying to get some money. I wasn’t even going to tell him where Sicarius really was.”
“Oh, how noble. You weren’t going to put us all at risk, but you were going to steal from someone else.”
“It wouldn’t be stealing if he was greedy enough to fall for it!”
Books stood up, disgust curling his lips. “Disregard what I said before. Most people never change.”
He climbed the ladder, taking his lantern with him, and left Akstyr in the dark.
Chapter 13
Amaranthe and Maldynado sat in a hollow scraped out between two hillocks of coal. They had their knees pulled up to their chins and their backs to the biting wind as the train barreled toward the mountains at fifty miles per hour. A few feet away, on the opposite side of the car, Basilard and Yara hunkered in a similar position. The coal hills wouldn’t provide much cover in a firefight, but Amaranthe didn’t think anyone looking in from the ends could spot her team. Sicarius hadn’t returned from scouting.
Amaranthe opened her pocket watch and tried to read the face, but clouds obscured the moon, and little light brightened the train. The dark, towering evergreens speeding by on either side further blocked the sky.
“I reckon he’s been gone an hour,” Maldynado said.
“I didn’t know clock-free time-telling was one of your skills.” Amaranthe tucked the watch back into her pocket. However long Sicarius had been gone, it felt like too long. If he was limiting his scouting to the roofs of the cars, there wasn’t that much area for him to explore. If he’d gone inside… he shouldn’t have. There were far too many alert soldiers in there.
“I got good at it when I was working for Costace,” Maldynado said.
“That was the lady in charge of the male escorts place, right?”