***
When Chaval had told Amaya about the train heists that had once plagued the longer, rural sections of the first Arkadian railroad tracks, she’d assumed it was hyperbole designed for dramatic effect. How insane or desperate did a thief have to be to actually try to board a moving train and steal its cargo? The entire premise was ludicrous. Talam had very few trains and had never experienced this problem, but she liked to think that even if her home country had a massive rail network, the average Talami criminal would be sensible enough to stick to bank robbery or something similar.
Later Chaval had clarified that actual heists didn’t involve men leaping from horseback onto a moving boxcar. Instead, a team on the inside of the train would force it to stop while the riders eventually came along to assist later. That made a lot more sense, and right now their team on the inside of the train was already moving into position.
Unfortunately, the presence of the Vakari meant that any plan relying solely on an inside job was very likely to fail. And so here she was, riding at full tilt with a dozen men after a moving train, just like the idiotic heist fantasy she’d concocted in her mind. The difference was that she wasn’t planning on throwing herself from horseback—several of her associates were magi.
And that changed the rules completely.
Their horses angled in on the train as they galloped at full bore, and the two men leading the charge drew their pistols. They each fired off a salvo when they closed within thirty meters, the purpose of which was twofold. Firstly, their men inside needed to know when it was time to move; and secondly, they wanted to spread as much panic as possible. That part of the plan she understood and approved of perfectly. The follow-up was what terrified her.
The two point men holstered their weapons and veered away as a second pair swept in past them. This duo moved within a few meters of the train, waiting for one of the half-open boxcars to catch up with them. They crouched up on their horses, and anyone watching from inside the train would probably think they were actually crazy enough to try to hop off the saddle and roll inside the car.
Instead a swirling vortex of wind and lightning materialized above them, looking for all the world like a tiny tornado reaching out of a thunderstorm. A second later the funnel dropped down and completely engulfed the riders—and suddenly the two men were standing comfortably inside the open boxcar.
Amaya took a deep breath and stood higher in the saddle. Her legs already ached from all the movement, but she bit down on her lip and forced herself to stay steady just as the magi had warned her. Out of the corner of the eye she saw them repeating the same spell, and the same vortex of air rippled just above her. She released her grip on the reins and stood even higher—
And then her entire world became a bright, searing light, as if someone had opened a window facing straight at the noon sun. She could still hear the rush of wind, the galloping of hooves, and even the screeching of the train on the rails, but she couldn’t move. For a moment she thought she might be dead, that either the two mercenary magi had turned on them or perhaps just screlled up the spell…
Her stomach wrenched, and then she was inside the boxcar, slamming against one of the metal walls. One of the men reached out to steady her, and she gasped for breath and waited for her balance to return. Somehow, after that, the thought of manually jumping from her horse didn’t seem like such a bad idea after all.
“Let’s go,” she croaked, then repeated it loudly enough they could actually hear it against the screeching wind. Off to the side their other escorts veered away, their job finished until the train came to a stop.
The two magi nodded in unison, and their hands flashed as they wove more spells. One of them touched her gently, and the air around her shimmered faintly. It was an odd sensation; her entire skin tingled as if she’d just rubbed her bare feet over and over across thick carpet. They’d practiced this earlier, though, and she knew it was apparently some type of spell meant to offer protection against bullets or even physical blows.
The two of them quickly swung themselves outside the cabin just enough to grab onto the rungs and climb to the top. It would have been nice if this box had been connected by a door to the others, but unfortunately the cargo cars here in the back were pretty well isolated from the passengers up front. Instead they would need to climb and maneuver carefully along the tops of several different cars.
At least, that’s what their enemies would assume. She had no plans of manually walking between moving train cars—that was only slightly less insane than leaping from the horse to the train. The idea was to bait some of their targets up top and make them split their forces while their team on the inside made their move. In the worst-case scenario, her escorts could shift them car by car with their magic if they had to.
Not that Amaya ever planned on doing that again if she could avoid it.
A minute later the three of them were crouched on top of the boxcar, the musty wind whipping past them so quickly she had to squint just to see anything. Muffled gunshots boomed from up ahead in the passenger cars, and she started to wonder if their prey might not take the bait after all.
Then an explosion rocked the car only a few meters in front of her, and she got her answer. Through the lingering flames Amaya could pick out a single auburn-haired woman leaning up out of an open hatch in the distance. Her palms flashed with searing flames, and another explosive sphere launched outwards towards them. She instinctively winced, knowing that if the Vakari’s aim was accurate they were all about to be cooked alive—
The sphere dissipated before it ever reached them. Her two companions both held their hands outward, and sparks of magic gathered at their fingertips.
Amaya smiled. Initially she hadn’t liked the idea of working with magi, let alone depending on them, but Chaval had insisted. He had gathered an impressive force of magi mercenaries who were disenfranchised with the Enclave—or who were simply greedy men like Polard—and for the first time she was glad for it. Now it was time to do her part.
She flattened herself against the car to steady her aim and fired. Even if she’d been sitting still, hitting such a small target at this range would have been difficult, but that was all right—she wasn’t actually going to permanently wound the Vakari with her pistol anyway. At least, not yet.
Amaya squeezed off an entire chamber’s worth of shots. Sparks flashed as a few of the bullets pelted the metal car, and one might have even connected judging by the way the Vakari abruptly lurched. Next to her, the two magi alternated jobs: one flung his own shimmering balls of magic towards their attacker, while the other worked to unravel any spells that got too close.
It was a dance she hoped they could maintain for a good while yet, and she quickly flipped open the revolver and started to reload. She’d just finished spinning in a new cylinder when one of the men cried out a warning. She glanced up and saw the Vakari vault herself up on top of the passenger cars. Her dark coat fluttered recklessly behind her, and of all things she unsheathed a sword from a partially-concealed scabbard at her side. What she possibly planned to do with it was the real question.
The woman raised a hand as if she was going to hurl another spell, but instead she leapt straight up into the air—
And then dropped down an instant later on top of another car. It was like she had completely stopped her own momentum and just let the train slide underneath her. She repeated the maneuver a second time, and now she was only twenty meters away. Suddenly the glimmering sword in her hand didn’t seem quite as ridiculous…
Amaya leveled her gun and fired. The Vakari didn’t even make an effort to dodge; the bullets ripped cleanly through her body, leaving splotches of luminescent blue blood across her black coat. Amaya shifted her aim to the legs, but even as the bullets shredded her target’s knees, the monster did little more than stumble for the briefest of moments before standing upright again.
“Distract her!” Amaya ordered as she reached into her pocket for the “special” bu
llets Chaval had prepared. She risked a quick glance upward as she pressed the new cylinder into place. Her magi partners had begun to unleash a coordinated assault of spells at this point. The air flashed and rumbled, but even the blasts of energy weren’t slowing the Vakari down.
Finally the man at her right seemed to gather all of his magical might, and four crackling sparks of what she could only describe as bundled lightning appeared in his hands. His partner repeated the motions, except instead of crackling electricity he summoned several spheres of brilliant orange-white flame.
They released their spells just as the Vakari made another jump. In the fraction of a second while she hung in the air, suspended above the train, she casually flicked her wrist—and a whirling funnel of violet-colored energy appeared right next to her. She landed upon the new car just as the spheres of lightning and fire struck, but instead of transforming her into an electrified torch, the spells immediately veered into the strange funnel. It swallowed them like a storm casually scooping up leaves, and despite the cacophony, Amaya heard the two magi gasp in unison.
It quickly got worse: the funnel shifted as the Vakari angled her hand, and with an angered roar like the rolling of distant thunder, it spit the crackling balls of lightning and fire back at their creators.
There was nowhere to hide, not exposed like they were. Amaya rolled to her left as quickly as she could, nearly hurling herself off the side of the moving car. With her free hand she grabbed a hold of the rungs they’d used to climb up and let her momentum do the rest. She caught a brief glimpse of her companions bursting into flame as she was violently flung back down into the half-open car. She screamed in anguish as something inside her arm tore, and she tumbled wildly across the metal floor before slamming into the wall.
It was a minor miracle she hadn’t lost her arm entirely or fallen unconscious, her entire arm was essentially dead weight at this point. Black specs dotted her vision as she tried to steel herself against the agony, but Amaya knew that if she passed out, she was dead. Her right hand still gripped her revolver, the only chance she had at all of walking away from this…
A loud thump signaled the entrance of the Vakari as she dropped down into the car and inspected her prey, her lip twisting in obvious revulsion.
“You’re lucky I’m hungry,” she said, her voice a cold, sullen whisper. “It’s much cleaner.”
Amaya smiled bitterly, raised her gun, and fired.
***
Zach swept his gaze from door to door in the passenger car, waiting for some gun-toting lunatics to charge inside one or the other. He didn’t have to wait very long. Less than a minute after Shaedra and Aram had vanished out the south exit, the north door burst open and an ensemble of said lunatics smashed their way inside, screaming for the passengers to lie down and stay still.
“Get down!” he warned the others, squeezing off a quick shot before taking cover himself.
The leading goon cried out as the bullet tore through his chest, and a spray of retaliating gunfire deflected off the metal benches and ricocheted all around the cabin. Zach gasped as several bullets embedded in his bench and nearly punched through—and he belatedly realized this cover wasn’t going to last long. The frenzied shrieking of the other passengers drowned everything else out, and he forced himself to breathe slowly as he waited for another opportunity to return fire.
“Stay on the ground!” one of the men yelled. “Wrong move, boy.”
“Don’t hit the girl!” another warned.
Zach bit down on his lip. So they were here for Eve, but they wanted to take her alive. Was that the reason Chaval had left them alone in Cadotheia? What did he have planned for—?
His breath caught in his throat when he glanced behind him to see Eve and Danev still sitting comfortably in their seats a meter away as if nothing had happened.
“Get down!” he hissed, reaching out to grab her leg and pull her down alongside him.
He never made it. Another shot fired, and the bench behind Danev sparked. The bullet lodged cleanly in the seat as if it had passed right through the big man.
“What the screll?” one of the thugs swore. Another shot pelted the bench, passing through Danev as if he were a ghost.
As if he weren’t even there.
Zach drew in a sharp breath as he suddenly got it, but his revelation was cut short by startled screams and a series of dull cracks and thuds from by the door. He risked a glance over his cover and saw Aram standing there in the doorway, a flurry of arms and feet tearing through the pack of armed men like they were helpless children. Only one managed another shot before Aram dropped him, but it soared wide and ricocheted off the ceiling. Soon the entire group was crumpled on the floor, dead or unconscious, and it was like a blanket of awed silence had been tossed over everyone in the car.
Aram spun and faced him. “Come on, there are probably more in the rear cabin.”
“Wha…” Zach breathed. He glanced back to the seat, and Eve and Danev were gone. He blinked several times and shook his head in bewilderment. Gregori Danev the illusionist…
He’d never seen that kind of magic in person. He hadn’t really understood how the Pampered Goddess even worked, or how a steady stream of clients could fall for such cheap parlor tricks. The answer was simple: there was nothing cheap about them. The man really could weave illusions, and damn convincing ones at that. So the question was when he and Eve had left, and where had they gone?
“Zach,” Aram repeated sternly. “Come on.”
He shook away his befuddlement and stood. The man he’d shot was lying still on the floor nearby, and it didn’t look like Aram had touched him. Zach had killed him.
The first time he had taken a life he hadn’t slept for almost three days. The second time he’d only had one rough night, and after a few battles he had become numb to it entirely. When he actually stopped to think about it—when he actually considered fully what he had done—twinges of guilt would still stab at his chest. But he’d learned to push it from his mind and focus on the task at hand, and as he looked down at the fresh corpse, he was more thankful for that discipline than ever.
Introspection could wait. Right now Eve was in trouble, and he needed to be sharp. He might even have to kill more of these kreel before this was all over.
Zach glanced up and gripped his pistol tightly. “Lead on.”
***
Eve concentrated on keeping her breathing steady as she and Danev dashed through the screaming passengers and booming gunfire to the rear of the train. She was still trying to come to grips with what she had just witnessed—a near perfect recreation of herself and Danev sitting on the bench. She’d seen plenty of illusions at Rorendal, but nothing so complicated or life-like. She also wasn’t convinced that leaving Zach behind was a good idea, but Danev had insisted it was all part of the distraction, and that the young man would be fine.
Now they were barreling forward to the other side of the train, and she wondered if the attackers might have stationed men in both the front and rear cars. Neither of them was armed, and she didn’t know what kind of magic he could weave to defend them if they were caught. She hadn’t even had time yet to concentrate and wrap a kinetic barrier around herself…
They’d almost reached the rearmost passenger car when more gunshots fired. Danev smothered her into an open seat. This particular car was only half full with people, and the passengers were all huddled together in their seats or crumpled on the ground. Eve did the same, and Danev’s palm suddenly rippled with Fane energy as he wove a spell. The air directly above them shimmered and then burst into a sparkling mist, almost like they were sitting inside the center of a cloud.
“It should conceal us,” he told her. “Just stay low and quiet.”
Eve nodded and pressed herself deeply into the seat. The rear door blasted open and a single warning shot splattered against the wall. She closed her eyes and squeezed her hands together to stay calm. Danev was crouched up and peering over the edge, apparently
confident in his illusion’s ability to conceal them. Eventually she decided to take the risk and follow his lead.
“Stay down and you won’t get hurt,” the leading man ordered in a commanding voice as he looked over the other passengers. He carried a short rifle she believed was called a “shotgun.” The three men behind him all had at least one revolver. Their eyes scoured the benches one-by-one as they crept forward.
The Dusties were halfway up the isle when a passenger popped up from one of the rear seats with his own gun. He fired, and the rearmost thug lurched backwards and screamed. His companions were fast—before the attacker could fire a second shot, a barrage of bullets peppered the bench he was using as cover. Eve ducked, fearing lethal ricochets, and pressed her hands into her ears to shield them from the din. It took every ounce of willpower she had not to cry out in terror.
The firefight was brief, and she assumed the would-be hero was dead. As the smoke began to disperse around the crouching goons, one of them shoved their wounded comrade—still crying out in agony—away from the pack. He hit the bench she and Danev were crouching behind and tumbled over right on top of them.
She shrieked as the body rolled over them, clamping her mouth far too late to make a difference. Danev was more dignified, but he didn’t fully succeed at avoiding the flailing limbs. Eve had no idea if the illusion could hide them after something like that, but it didn’t matter: as blood poured liberally from the man’s wound, he managed to pull the trigger on the gun still in his hand. It was a completely wild shot, but it went straight through Danev’s calf. The illusionist screamed, and the faint cloud of magic shimmering around them vanished.
The goons turned almost as one. The leader smiled broadly as he reloaded his shotgun.
“Well, well. Looks like you finally did something right, Gurney.”
The wounded man tried to speak, but his breathing was erratic as he clutched at his chest on the floor. Eve tried to look away from the blood but couldn’t. Her muscles had frozen, and she could barely breathe. She just sat there, staring down at the carnage in horror…
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