I’m on the Norwich train leaving now, I told Cinder. I walked up the train, winding my way between the seats. The train was about two-thirds full, and I had to twist aside to avoid a fat man struggling to get his briefcase into the overhead racks.
Where’s Del?
If I’m lucky, back in Liverpool Street with those mercenaries and about fifty police. I opened the door to the next carriage and stepped through. The train swayed under my feet as I walked, the wheels going thunkity-thunk as it accelerated, and I had to make an effort to keep my balance, all while searching the futures for danger, looking for the telltale signature of gate magic with my magesight, and keeping open the mental links to Cinder and to November all at the same time.
The windows went black as the train entered a tunnel, brightened as we came out into the sun, went black again. I watched closely for any signs of gating. Combat adepts are dangerous, but they usually don’t have the detection abilities that mages do. I’d very carefully not done anything between the street and the train that would show up on magesight. With any luck, they wouldn’t be able to follow me. And Rachel hadn’t gotten close enough to see what train I’d boarded. There shouldn’t be any way she should be able to figure out that I was on this train—
Rachel was going to gate onto this train.
I swore out loud. Several passengers glanced up at me from where they were seated, then looked hurriedly away. I was still wearing my combat armour, plus whatever dust and dirt I’d picked up from the fighting. I didn’t know what I looked like, but judging from the way people were shying away, it wasn’t reassuring. Cinder, your psycho ex is following me. You want to make up with her, get on board.
On my way.
Er, Mr. Verus, November said. Is this a bad time?
No, no, it’s just wonderful, I said. Rachel is going to gate into the back carriage in about twenty seconds. What did you want to talk about in the meantime?
Well, it’s just that I’ve intercepted some communications from Mage Barrayar. Apparently he’s received a report from Crash’s team that they suspect you of being aboard one of two trains departing Liverpool Street, and he’s calling in reinforcements. He seems quite agitated.
What kind of—you know what, I don’t have time. Where’s Crash’s team?
I believe two of them are teleporting onto this train now.
Oh, come on!
A flicker of space magic from up ahead confirmed the news. Now I had Rachel behind, and the adepts in front.
“Fine,” I muttered to myself. I strode forward to the next set of carriage doors and found the nearest toilet. It was vacant, which spared me the embarrassment of having to evict someone. I closed the door, locked it, and waited.
Standing in the cramped space, balancing on the swaying floor, I had time to wonder at how crazy my life was. I was hiding in a train toilet so that I could ambush my insane ex-fellow-apprentice water mage and draw her into a fight against a group of adept mercenaries who were after me to steal back an artificial intelligence that I was carrying because it could give me leverage on one of the people running the country who’d originally wanted me dead because I’d failed to get him the artefact that was currently eating its way up my arm but who had only managed to get me sentenced to death because I’d failed to cover up the crimes that my ex-girlfriend had committed while possessed by a jinn.
How had I managed to end up like this?
I shook it off. Back to work.
Rachel was approaching from one side, the adepts from the other. I adjusted the futures with the fateweaver, pulling Rachel in, slowing the adepts down. The creak of a door sounded from outside as Rachel entered my carriage. She stopped just outside.
I yanked open the door just as Rachel was about to fire, catching her by wrist and throat and slamming her against the side of the train. Her spell went high, disintegrating the roof right above us and bringing a roar of wind and noise and dust down into the carriage. Rachel’s eyes stared into mine from behind her mask, shock and fury mixed together as she struggled to break my grip.
I could have killed Rachel in that moment. Two things stopped me: my promise to Cinder, and the other targets. Rachel tried another disintegration ray, and I forced her hand away, lining the spell’s futures up with the length of the train just as the door at the far end of the carriage flew open and Stickleback stepped through.
The green ray flew the length of the carriage, missing the shocked and yelling passengers on the seats, and hit Stickleback square-on. She managed to throw up one of her violet force fields; it almost stopped the spell, but not quite. A thread of the ray brushed her side and she fell back, her face contorting in pain. Rachel fired another ray and I aimed it to finish Stickleback off, but another future cut across: Jumper blinked into existence just before the strike could land and opened up a portal that the ray disappeared into.
The passengers on the train were screaming and the wind was roaring through the hole above. Rachel and I struggled, swaying back and forth. Rachel’s shock had been replaced with rage and she tried to kick me, then when that didn’t work reconfigured her shield into a short-range disintegration ring. I jumped up, bounding off the wall to get my feet above the lethal green pulse, caught the edges of the hole in both hands, and kicked Rachel in the face. She went sprawling, her magic shredding the door, and I pulled myself up through the hole and onto the train roof.
Wind whipped at me, blasting at my hair and sliding off my armour. We’d come out of the tunnels and onto a stretch of open track, the landmarks of east London opening up before us. To my left the Olympic stadium was sliding past, while to the right I could see the towers of Canary Wharf. I ran forward, pushing against the wind, my feet echoing with dull thuds on the roof as I kept my balance against the sway of the train.
A green ray shot up into the sky above and behind, followed by another as Rachel fired blind through the roof. I felt the surge of force magic below as Stickleback answered, but it was aimed at Rachel, not me. I jumped a carriage and kept running, putting distance between us.
Mr. Verus, November said anxiously. I’m having trouble tracking our location. Are we safe?
Yes! I jumped another carriage. Just perfect, but I’m a LITTLE busy!
Well, it’s just that Barrayar is vectoring—
I felt a thump vibrate through the roof and looked back to see Crash straightening from where he’d landed. He started towards me, breaking into a charge, keeping his balance seemingly without effort on the swaying train.
There was no room to dodge this time. I made my decision in a split-second, turned, and leapt at Crash feet first.
The wind that had been checking me became my ally, and my feet slammed into Crash’s stomach, throwing him nearly head over heels. He slammed back onto the roof, scrabbling for purchase, only barely stopping himself from rolling off the edge. I fell a little more gracefully and hauled myself up as Crash rose to face me. He looked pissed off but there was a wariness in his eyes now, and as he advanced his stance showed more respect.