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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.’
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.
