There might be prisoners in this car, but they were not Elbert or Wil.
He moved on to the next car. It stank of oil and steam and burned metal. Faintly, he caught the scent of the boy’s blood. Old. No other smell of him. And still no smell of his brother. The tuning fork remained quiet.
The last car was filled with scents. The heavy, moldy pall of Mr. Shunt filled his nose. Cedar stifled a growl and licked his muzzle. Mr. Shunt had been there, but he was not there now. He could not kill him, tear him apart, dig out the bits of him that made him tick. There was no movement, no talking, no signs that Mr. Shunt and Shard LeFel had returned to the car.
Other odors filled the air—Shard LeFel’s rich cologne, meat, liquor, metals, old wood.
The smell of Elbert was in that car—the musky milk scent of a child deeply sleeping, strong and alive. Cedar’s heart quickened with hope. If that was true, he had a chance to save Elbert, to bring the child back to his father alive.
All he had to do was find a way into the railcar. He sniffed along the edge of the car, looking for a trap, a latch, a door in. And then he caught the scent of his brother.
Wil. Here. Above him. Wounded. The rot of infection was already tainting the smell of his blood. But it was new blood. It was not the smell of death. Wil still breathed.
Cedar wanted to howl with joy, but that joy was short-lived. To save his brother, he had to get into the car. It was not flesh that stood in his way; it was wood and metal, latch and hinge, things that took a man’s hands, a man’s fingers.
All the claw in the world would do him no good.
The ground shook. The matic Shard LeFel and Mr. Shunt rode was coming closer. Cedar hunkered down beneath the edge of the car. Shard LeFel’s matic huffed across the ground. It rolled up the ridge and would be at the rail any minute.
Cedar waited. Waited for Shard LeFel and Mr. Shunt to walk up the stairs and open the doors. And once they opened the doors, he would no longer need them, or their hands.
The steam-powered matic huffed nearer and nearer.
Over that noise, Cedar could just make out the sound of men shifting in their tents.
Easy kill. Heart. Throat. Brain.
No. Men would not slake his thirst. He wanted the Strange. He wanted the Strange who took Elbert and hurt Wil. He wanted Mr. Shunt. Dead.
No other creature moved. Not even those who were inside the carriage above him. It was as if the whole of the world held its breath.
The matic grew louder until Cedar’s teeth rattled from the vibration of it. It stopped next to the tracks in front of the first car Cedar had investigated. A hiss of steam expelled in a roll of heat; then the huffing slowed and slowed, like a heart losing the will to beat.
Cedar waited for the footsteps. Waited for the stride. Waited for the hands to open the way to the boy, the way to his brother. Waited for Mr. Shunt.
A rattle of a hinge. The door on the matic swung open. Then bootheels scuffed down metal stairs. One set of boots was Shard LeFel’s; another set of boots shushed and smooth, almost without noise, belonged to Mr. Shunt. And the third set of footsteps was smaller, lighter than Shard LeFel’s. Who?
Cedar took a sniff, and caught the honey and flower scent of Mae Lindson. She was alive. But captured.
Rage pushed through him and the beast squirmed under his hold. Kill.
He bared his teeth, holding back a growl. They needed to be closer. They needed to open the door. Then they needed to die.
They said nothing as they hurried down the track, Shard LeFel’s cane clacking like a second hand ticking seconds into minutes along the dead iron rail.
Cedar counted footsteps. Three people. Counted scents. LeFel, Shunt, Mae. Mae was not bleeding, but he could smell her anger. And her fear.
Cedar could not suppress the sudden, livid anger at the thought of Mae in that monster’s hand. The beast inside twisted again with the rage of Mae’s capture. He pulled his muscles tight, ready to lunge. They walked up the stairs, Shard LeFel in the front, Mr. Shunt in the back, Mae Lindson between them.
Wait, the part of him that was a man commanded. Wait for the door to open.
Shard LeFel pulled a chain of keys out of a fold of cloth and unlocked the bolt on the door, but did not open it.
“Hurry, Mr. Shunt,” he said. “The moon will soon be at the end of its journey and I will have no time left.”
Mae Lindson gasped and stumbled up the stairs, pushed or pulled by her captors.
This. Now. The door. Run.
Cedar’s muscles pushed.
A flash of light burned against the southern sky, and the sound of something crashing through the trees rolled like thunder.
Shard LeFel paused at the door and swore in a language Cedar had never heard.
“The Madders,” he breathed. “I will not have the king’s dogs keep me from my passage. Go,” he commanded. “Kill them. I want their flesh in bits, and their bones crushed so fine they won’t fill a tobacco box.”
“And the matics?” Mr. Shunt asked.
“Yes, yes. Release them. All of them. But keep your Strangeworks near. Kill the Madders, kill Miss Small if she is fool enough to be with them, and kill every man and woman in the town if that is what it takes to keep them from my threshold this night.”
Rose Small?
Cedar growled so softly, it was almost too quiet for even his sharp ears to hear.
But Mr. Shunt paused, his boot soles scuffing the rocks and dirt. His body shifted with a subtle rub of fabric over metal and bone, oil and blood dripping into warm, soft folds of flesh and cloth as he bent to look under the railcar where Cedar crouched in shadow, eyes slit.
He had a prod in his hands. Just like the one that had wounded Cedar.
If Cedar leaped now, the door would remain closed. He would have no way to save Wil or Elbert.
If Cedar held still, Mr. Shunt walked free.
Both. He wanted the door open and Mr. Shunt dead.
Cedar held his breath and did not make a sound, though the tuning fork on his chest burned hot enough it felt like it was searing a hole through his fur. If he moved, he knew the fork would ring out. If he moved, he knew he would tear Mr. Shunt apart, lose all reason, and lose his chance to save Elbert and Wil.
Strange. The Strange who took the boy. Attack. Fight. Kill.
Cedar pushed back against that belly-deep need, his control of the beast slipping. He needed the door to the car open. Needed it as much as he needed Mr. Shunt’s neck in his jaws.
The open door would save Wil. Save Elbert. The open door would save Mae.
“Kill them,” Shard LeFel said. “Quickly, before the moon sets, or I will shatter the Holder, and the door for the Strange will remain closed forever.”
Mr. Shunt straightened, the whisper of wool and silk stroking his leather boot tops. Cedar could smell the hatred on him. The ever-so-slight whir of a spring coiling and uncoiling beneath those folds of cloth where only bone and blood and heart should be filled Cedar’s ears.
“Of course, Lord LeFel,” Mr. Shunt whispered. Mr. Shunt took a step away.
Cedar strained to hear the carriage door open.
But instead, a great noise roared out into the night. It didn’t sound quite human, but it was a voice, not quite a man’s, raised in a yell of pain, of fury.
Behind that voice was the ungodly screeching of iron bending, straining, breaking. Something was coming down the rail. Something was tearing up the rail. And whatever that creature was, it was surely coming this way.
“Go!” Shard LeFel hissed as he finally opened the door.
Cedar leaped out from beneath the carriage and crashed into Mr. Shunt, knocking him to the ground. He snapped at Shunt’s face, but the Strange snarled and blocked his jaws with one hand.