by Cela Day
Then he crossed the car to the lion’s cage and unhooked the locking latch on its door. The lion watched him with disinterested eyes. Nothing but its tail moved, twitching as the cage’s door opened.
Hunter backed slowly away from the door. In his nervousness he nearly tripped over his own two feet, but the lion didn’t move.
Never taking his eyes off the lion, Hunter groped behind himself for the edge of the car. Finding it, he squatted in the entrance, gripped the edge with both hands, and lowered himself to the ground. With both hands he grabbed the door’s handle.
Just before pulling it shut, he paused. His eyes left the lion for one split second to glance at the Princess lying in the straw: helpless, beautiful.
Innocent—
And not ten feet away from the lion.
Hunter slammed the door and barred it shut.
The train’s whistle shrieked. Startled, he jumped away from the tracks. He hadn’t been paying attention to the sounds that meant the train was about to get underway. The metal wheels squealed as the great engine heaved the first cars forward.
This was it, then. The train was moving on, carrying the Princess—and the lion.
Carrying the mirror, his only hope of ever returning to his own world.
Carrying the witch.
He could have run alongside the still slow-moving cars. He could have reached out and grabbed a handle and, clutching and clawing, swung himself up and onboard, holding onto his old life in a death-grip.
Hoping the Princess died in the lion’s claws.
Hoping the witch someday released her prisoner from the mirror so they could return to their own world through the portal—no matter who or what sought to destroy them there.
But all of that meant he’d have to continue serving the witch.
And so Hunter didn’t run after the train. He simply stood by the tracks, watching as it picked up speed, hoping something greater than himself would be kinder to the Princess than he’d been to her.
And, perhaps, kind even to him. Perhaps the witch would be too involved with her new life to pursue and destroy him for deserting her.
He didn’t know where he would go or what he would do in this strange new world. But anything would be better than the life he’d made for himself when he’d thought he ruled his own fate.
He took the last swig from his flask, and, stumbling a little, made his way back down the tracks. The train raced by him through the night in the other direction.
BIANCA WOKE WITH A headache. Her eyes fluttered open but she let them fall shut again, for even that slight movement made the pain throb.
Am I sick?
But she was never sick. So she lay still, trying to remember how she’d felt when she’d gone to bed. Then she realized she couldn’t remember going to bed.
She felt straw beneath her fingers. At least that made sense.
I was going to sleep with Lady.
But even though the straw felt right, the smell was wrong. That wasn’t Lady’s smell, which reminded Bianca of grassy earth; this smell was too sharp, too acrid.
And the sounds she was hearing weren’t Lady’s sounds, either.
“Lady?” she murmured, hoping to feel Lady’s trunk snuffling her hands or face.
Instead, she heard something low and guttural—almost like a growl.
Her eyes flew open. Despite the pain in her head she sat up.
In the dark, ten feet away, shone the slanting yellow eyes of a huge cat.
Dear God.
It was a thought; it was a prayer; it was a plea.
She knew where she must be, for she knew everyone—and every animal—on the show.
But why am I in the big cats’ car?
As Bianca remained motionless in the dark and the yellow eyes didn’t move, the initial thrill of shock faded and her heartbeat slowed. The big cats didn’t terrify her, for although she’d never worked personally with them she’d seen them every day of her life. And of course she knew they always traveled safely locked away in their cages.
The car was illuminated only by moonlight through the open roof-vent. She looked at the yellow eyes again and recognized Leo, the lion.
Not ten feet away, and his cage’s door stood wide open.
“Dear God.” This time she whispered the words aloud.
Leo was still watching her, and she couldn’t help thinking his expression was like that of a house cat waiting at a mouse hole. She wondered if she could make it to the door and slide it open before he leaped on her—if he was going to.
Would he? Would he maul her with those claws? Tear her with those teeth?
He’d never mauled Fred, but Fred worked with him every day, and kept Leo fed.
She hoped, with all her heart, that Leo had been fed recently.
She risked a glance at the door. But the train was moving at full speed; she could hear the wheels racing down the tracks and feel the car swaying as they ate up the miles toward the next stop. If she somehow got the door open and jumped from the train now she probably wouldn’t survive the fall; most likely she’d break every bone in her body. It was just another violent way to die, although somewhat less grisly than being eaten by a lion.
Leo’s maw opened in a jaw-splitting yawn that made her heart beat faster. Still he made no movement toward her. But how much longer would he wait?
The train lurched and something like a thin rough hand slapped her face. She bit back a cry before realizing it was the rope ladder Fred had tied to the roof-vent in case he needed an emergency exit. She glanced at the aperture overhead and saw the moon riding high in the sky.
She knew right then that if she tried to think about what she must do she might never move. She’d continue sitting there, mesmerized by the sight of Leo and the thought of what might happen, until it was too late.
The next moment Bianca was half-way up the ladder, swinging wildly, praying she wouldn’t feel sharp teeth or claws sinking into her back or tearing her unguarded legs. But she felt nothing except rough hemp scratching her hands.
Then her head and shoulders were through the vent. Hands flat on the roof, she heaved herself up and out of the car, then looked back down, breathing heavily.
Leo had finally moved. Pale in the moonlight, he nosed at the straw where she’d been. He looked up, and for one moment his yellow eyes seemed to reproach her for her unexpected departure.
Then his lips curled back in a snarl.
She slammed the vent shut. A moment later a heavy body crashed against it, then fell with a thud that made the entire car shudder.
Then, silence.
She didn’t think Leo could break through to the roof; at least, she prayed he couldn’t.
Now that she was safe—if sitting on the roof of a speeding train could be called “safe”—she felt herself trembling. Adrenalin rushed through her and late summer night air rushed over her, drying her sweat to a chill.
The sound of the train racing down the tracks could have been her own heart racing in her chest.
Chugga-chugga chugga-chugga chugga-chugga chugga-chugga—
Thudda-thudda thudda-thudda thudda-thudda thudda-thudda—
At least the fresh air blew away whatever fog remained from the drug Hunter had made her breathe. And the night was clear—except for a thick-looking blackness ahead that could be a gathering storm.
But right here, right now, the moon and stars were big and bold overhead. So bright, so beautiful, that if they’d burst into song she wouldn’t have been surprised.
The train lurched. If she hadn’t been kneeling, still grasping the vent’s handle, she might have been thrown off.
Then she felt a light spatter of rain on her face. The train and the storm front were rushing toward each other; outlying clouds were already blotting out the stars.
I need to get off this roof.
She knew some of the animals had been moved to different cars after Lady arrived. She’d been too busy to notice where most ended up, but she though
t Lady’s car might be the very next one in the train, hitched behind the big cats’ car. If she could get into Lady’s car, she would be safe.
But unlike the performers’ sleeper cars, a stockcar didn’t have an end door that opened onto a platform connecting it to the next car in the train. A stockcar only had a side door, roof-vent, and ladders. Which meant that to get into Lady’s car, she’d need to make her way to the end of the big cats’ roof, down a ladder, and across the coupling between the two cars—she decided not to think about that part yet—to the ladder on Lady’s car. Then up the ladder and across Lady’s roof to the vent, down through the vent, and—voila!
Safe and sound. Nothing to it.
I’ve made it this far. I can do this.
She breathed another prayer, let go of the vent’s handle, and started crawling toward the end of the car. The train jolted to the right but she braced her arms to compensate. The train swayed again, and again she moved with it.
This isn’t so bad.
In fact, it reminded her a little of riding Lady, although the train jerked and jolted her in ways Lady never did. And of course she and Lady trusted each other. Cared for each other.
The train didn’t care. She mustn’t forget that, not for one moment.
Bianca moved forward as the night wind rushed over her, splattering her back with needle-sharp raindrops. Fortunately, although the roof’s edges curved to allow rain to run off, narrow wooden slats ran down the center, forming a sort of boardwalk. She followed a slat all the way to the end of the car, spotted the top of the ladder, and crawled toward it. Grasping the first rung in both hands, she slid her legs over the edge of the train, feeling for an unseen rung below with the toes of her boots.
There. She clutched the ladder’s vertical supports with both hands, easing her way down from one rung to the next.
The train lurched and for one brief moment she dangled helplessly above the fast-moving surface of the earth. But no; she was still clutching the ladder; she was still part of the train.
And then she reached the bottom.
She was standing on a narrow ridge that was nothing like the generous platforms designed for human traffic at the end of the sleeper cars. This was little more than the base of the coupling joining the two stockcars together. She felt the vibration of the train’s wheels on the metal rails, a deep hum in her bones and teeth.
She glanced over her shoulder and saw the next car’s ladder across the coupling. It was on the opposite side of the car, as far away from where she now stood as it could possibly be.
Somehow, she had to reach that ladder.
With one arm looped around her ladder’s vertical support she leaned sideways, stretching her arm across the coupling. Even as she tried she knew it was hopeless; she couldn’t reach the other ladder while she faced the big cats’ car. She had to turn around.
She took a deep breath and shuffled sideways on the ridge until she stood next to her ladder. Then, still clutching its vertical support in one hand, she slowly and carefully turned around so she was facing the next car.
She leaned forward, one arm clutching her ladder and the other reaching for the ladder on the next car. But the distance was too great; her fingers didn’t even brush the ladder’s support.
She was going to have to jump.
Dear God.
She took another deep breath, bending her knees. And then, without pausing to think about it, she launched into a forward-leaning leap across the coupling.
Across the rails that flew beneath her—
Her fingers touched the ladder just before her feet found the ridge-base of the next car. She clung to the new ladder’s vertical support like a cub to its mother as her toes scrabbled for the lowest rung.
They found it; she was on. She wrapped both arms around the ladder’s supports and pressed her forehead against a cold rung. For one moment she stayed still, just breathing, while raindrops pelted her.
As she reached for the next rung, her boot nearly slipped on wet metal.
Careful!
Slowly she climbed the ladder. Then she was crawling across the car’s roof, down the wood-slatted boardwalk to the vent. Fortunately the vent was open, but it was so dark now she couldn’t see into the depths below.
“Lady?” she called, but the train’s speed and the storm’s rising wind whipped her voice away into the night.
Lightning flashed overhead and she glimpsed a pile of straw beneath the vent. If she dropped straight down, she wouldn’t land on anything that would hurt her.
Or anyone she could hurt.
She gripped the vent’s edge with both hands as she lowered her legs through the aperture. For one moment she dangled in the dark at arms’ length, then let go, flexing her knees to absorb the impact as she landed. But it was a soft landing, not much different from jumping down to the ground after climbing a tree.
She stayed where she’d landed in a crouch, still not certain where she was. It was too dark to see anything, but when she whispered, “Lady?” there was no answer.
This isn’t Lady’s car.
She tried to swallow her disappointment, but it seemed to stick in her throat and make her nose prickle. She scrubbed her nose with the back of her hand.
Now was no time to start crying like a little girl.
Another flash of lightning and she saw, several feet away, a pair of large liquid eyes she recognized: one of Daphne’s beautiful show horses.
She breathed a relieved sigh, for she knew where she was now: the horsecar. She also knew Daphne didn’t travel with her horses, but Bianca didn’t mind spending the night alone with them. It wasn’t the same as being with Lady, of course, but it was infinitely better than being trapped with the big cats.
Now that she knew where she was, she could hear smaller noises that made sense: straw rustling, soft snores, the occasional snort. The sounds of horses dreaming horsy dreams.
She walked over to the stalls and rubbed the nose of the horse that was looking at her. It nuzzled her hand, searching for a treat. Bianca turned her pockets inside out, but they were empty.
“Just a sec,” she whispered.
She knew there must be fodder in the car somewhere. She felt her way along the wall, hoping she wouldn’t trip over anything.
She kicked something. Not hard enough to hurt her booted foot, but not exactly soft, either. She knelt and felt something rough, almost like burlap. A sack of oats, or some other feed?
She poked one finger beneath what felt like a flap and touched, not grain, but a mass that was both firm and giving. She lifted the bag to her nose and sniffed. It smelled exactly like the inside of the chow tent after Cookie baked the day’s bread.
She had no idea why Daphne would leave a loaf of bread in a feedbag in the horsecar, but she was glad, because she was starving.
She slipped her hand inside the bag and tore off half the loaf. The back of her hand touched something cool and smooth.
An apple.
Not a candied apple, of course, but you couldn’t have everything.
She slipped the bread and the apple into her pockets and flipped the bag’s flap shut. She realized then that she was kneeling, not on straw, but on a blanket. It didn’t smell too musty, so she picked it up too before making her way back to the stalls.
“Here you go,” she said, offering the apple to the horse. “Let’s have supper.”
The horse took the apple between its teeth. Bianca wrapped the blanket around her damp shoulders, sank to the floor next to the stall, and bit into her chunk of bread. It tasted like heaven. She chewed and swallowed, leaned her head against the stall’s door, and fell asleep.
Chapter Six
“SOMEONE’S TAKEN MY blanket!”
Glint’s voice was a near-wail.
The train had pulled into its next stop. In the rose-dawn light slanting through the roof-vent, the seven dwarf brothers were waking in the horsecar. It was the only space left in the train large enough to house seven people, but
the brothers didn’t mind. They’d roughed it in far worse quarters, and they’d already made their end of the car homey: the floor was swept clean of straw, and seven folding cots stood in a row against the wall, with six neat little knapsacks standing next to them. The seventh sack, which stood at the end of the row next to Eld’s cot, was big and bulging. On the foot of six of the cots was a folded blanket (even though dwarves, being made of sterner stuff than most of us, typically never use blankets except in the dead of winter).
“Come now, brother,” Gripper said to Glint. “You know you thrash in your sleep. You probably kicked the blanket off; look under your cot.”
“I did look, and it’s gone!”
“If you weren’t using it, brother, why would you care?” Gripper asked, sensible as always.
“Because it’s my blanket!”
“The baby of the family,” Grinder said under his breath. “True to form.”
There was a rustling sound as Glint opened his knapsack.
“And look—someone’s been eating my bread!”
“Your bread? What bread?” Gripper demanded.
“And my apple! Someone’s taken my apple!”
“What apple?”
“The bread and apple I stowed in my pack in case I got hungry at night!”
“But the new day is dawning, brother,” Gripper said. “We’ve less than an hour ‘til breakfast. Why make such a fuss? Some hungry soul—”
“You aren’t hungry souls! You’re my own flesh and blood, and I wouldn’t expect you to be taking my food without my leave!”
“There now, brother, this is no way to start the new day!” Eld pressed through the others who’d gathered around the foot of Glint’s cot and grasped his youngest brother’s shoulder. Leaning in so they were face-to-face, he spoke in a low voice no one else could hear. Glint shook his head stubbornly at first, but gradually, as Eld persisted, the younger dwarf’s face softened into a sheepish expression. Finally, he nodded.
Eld released his grip on Glint’s shoulder, then patted it.
“Go on, then, brother.” He walked away.
Glint cleared his throat and turned to the rest. “I owe you all an apology, brothers,” he said. “I should not be so determined to call the things of this world my own. And I should not jump to conclusions. I need to be thinking a bit more before I speak.”
