Chasing the Valley (20 page)

 

 

‘Lucky they extended the train line to Gunning,'
I say.

None of the others respond. The shock is wear­ing off now, fading into sheer exhaustion. But if I let myself succumb, if I give into the silence, there will be no distraction from what happened tonight. I will have to face up to it – all of it. The wanted posters, Hackel's betrayal, the fire . . . and Lukas Morrigan, son of the king.

For all I know, Lukas could be dead by now. Maybe he burned in the fire. Wasn't that what I wanted, for all the Morrigans to burn like my family? But all I can see is his green eyes, his smile, the calculated betrayal as he pulls his kite down from the stars.

It makes an awful kind of sense now. Why Lukas appeared in the forest, only a day's travel from the crashed biplane. Why the plane's captain was missing from the wreck. Why he carried so many priceless alchemic objects, why he knew so much about Sharr Morrigan, who must be his
cousin
 . . . The thought makes me feel nauseated, so I pummel my forehead with my knuckles and try to restart the conversation.

‘I wonder why they extended the train line,' I say. ‘Maisy, didn't you say this part of the line didn't exist when your encyclopedia was printed?'

Maisy nods. ‘And the book's only a few years old. They must have extended the line very recently.'

‘I thought most of the tax funds were being spent on the war effort . . . you wouldn't have thought they'd waste all that cash on a train line to Gunning, of all places.'

‘I reckon the bureaucrats were just keen for a party at the Gunning Hotel,' says Teddy. ‘Wouldn't put it past 'em.'

‘It's
strange,' says Maisy. ‘The railway never came this far north because it was too hard to cross the mountains. They tried tunnelling through, decades ago, but the earth was too unstable. And they can't just run a track over the mountaintops – not with the height of those peaks, and the risk of snowfall and falling trees . . .' She frowns. ‘I wonder how they've done it.'

‘And
why
they've done it,' I add.

We fall into silence, staring out the compart­ment window. It's dark outside, so mostly we just see our own reflections, but occasionally a farmhouse or village will provide enough light to pierce the glass.

Maisy's question is answered after several hours of travel, when we reach the top of a craggy hill. The country around here is ridiculously uneven – it's obvious from the train's movements that we're heading towards the mountains. Just as we're cresting the top of the hill, there's a violent jolt in our carriage.

I jerk upright, startled out of my misery. The others are suddenly alert and wide-eyed. Their knuckles whiten on the edges of their seats. There's another jerk, then a whistle. Something yanks from above, as though the train is a fish on a hook.

‘What's going on?'

‘I don't know!'

The carriage
lifts.
Machinery grinds, the whistle blasts, and then our carriage clunks up to meet the sky. I stagger upright and heave our window open. A blast of freezing air floods the compartment, but I stick my head outside.

A vast concrete pylon sprouts from the top of the hill, illuminated by the train's headlight. Dozens more punctuate the route ahead, painting a line of pylons up into the encroaching mountains. They are joined by a thick network of stone and cables, arranged like an upside-down lacework. The cables spark with silver and alchemy. Our train has been jerked up away from the ground and now we dangle from the cables, ready to be winched towards the mountains.

It's ingenious, really: a perfect shortcut across the mountains that divide Northern Taladia from the south. King Morrigan couldn't drill through the mountains, or run a normal train line over its peaks. But this solution – a suspended train, winched between pylons – is enough to take my breath away. I can't begin to grasp the amount of silver, or alchemic enchantments, that went into crafting this sky-bound railroad. The train's name makes sense now:
Bird of the North.
A train that almost seems to fly between our nation's divided halves.

I duck back inside and slam the window. It's too late to keep the cold out, though. The others rub their hands together and shiver as I report my findings.

‘It's like a chairlift,' Maisy breathes. ‘I read about them in a history book – they used to build them in the ancient western cities. But a chairlift large enough to carry a whole train . . .' She shakes her head. ‘Imagine the level of alchemy involved.'

‘Imagine how much it must have cost,' says Clementine, looking impressed.

‘Yeah,' mutters Teddy. ‘Bet you could feed Rourton's scruffer kids for years with that much cash.'

I stare at the black window, and my reflection stares back. The train is tilting upward now, into the mountains. Outside we must be passing pylons, climbing that network of cables through the dark. If I ever needed proof of King Morrigan's resources . . . 

But why? The king doesn't need to impress anyone – let alone a pack of richie partygoers. There must have been some urgent need, some hidden reason to build this route across the mountains.

‘Why?' I say aloud. ‘Why bother to build it now, and why to a useless town like Gunning?'

There is no response. We settle back into our spots and wait for the night to pass.

When morning comes, I awake to sunlight
through the compartment window. I must have dozed off because my eyes are bleary, and I can't remember the last few hours passing.

Teddy and Clementine are still asleep, but Maisy smiles at me when I open my eyes.

‘Are you all right, Danika?' she whispers.

I nod. ‘You?'

‘Yes, I'm okay. I was just looking out at the mountains.'

I twist around to stare out the window. Now that it's light outside, I can actually see the landscape passing by. We are high above a valley, in the midst of the Central Mountains. Below our carriage, everything falls away into a white fog. I don't want to imagine how cold it must be outside. I can see the very top of each pylon as it passes – but below, all is mist.

‘I wonder if this is how birds feel,' I say, pressing my fingers against the glass.

I find myself wanting to turn to Lukas, to ask him if this is what he sees when he borrows the eyes of an eagle. Then I remember, with a surge of fresh pain, why he is not here. He doesn't need to borrow a bird's eyes to fly through clouds. He's done it himself, in a palace biplane full of bombs.

‘Are you . . .?' Maisy begins, a little hesitant. She wrings her fingers together nervously, then starts again. ‘Are you worried about Lukas?'

‘Why would I worry about
him
?' I realise from Maisy's expression that I'm at risk of waking the others, so I force myself to lower my voice before I continue. ‘I mean, he's a traitor. He's a royal. He dropped bombs on Rourton, just like the rest of those filthy pilots.'

‘No, he didn't,' Maisy says.

‘Of course he did!'

Maisy shakes her head. ‘When we found his plane in the forest, all of the bombs were still intact. Remember? I thought it was strange that a biplane pilot would wait around after the attack without having dropped any bombs.'

I turn back to the window. ‘Who cares? He was still part of the bombing raid. Maybe something just went wrong with his mechanism and he couldn't drop the bombs.'

‘I don't think the royals have much choice, Danika,' says Maisy. ‘They
have
to become soldiers or hunters or pilots when they're young. It's a tradition. And he's King Morrigan's own son – for all we know, the king might even have chosen his skill for him.'

‘Lukas should have run away, then! He shouldn't have joined a mission to bomb innocent people's houses.'

Maisy doesn't have an answer for that. Maybe I've snapped too angrily, scared her into silence again. She's been speaking up more often in the last few days, and I'm starting to forget how timid she can be.

The train jerks to a stop regularly, every fifteen minutes or so. It only lasts twenty seconds – just long enough for power to sizzle across the cables, recharging the train's energy. There's nothing new to see, though, just fog. I press my fingers against the glass and stare into a sea of white.

When the others wake up, we try to figure out a plan. Clementine wants to stay on the train as long as possible.

‘But we don't even know where the train line heads next,' Teddy says. ‘I don't reckon it's gonna veer off east towards the Magnetic Valley, do you?'

Clementine scowls. ‘Of course not, but it's better than nothing. If we cover enough distance by train, we'll save ourselves weeks of walking.'

‘Yeah, great plan,' says Teddy sarcastically. ‘And if anyone recognises our faces, we'll save ourselves decades of breathing.'

I clear my throat. ‘Um, aren't you forgetting something?'

‘What?'

‘This carriage is hanging in the air. We could be hundreds of metres high, for all we know. Unless you've got a way to sprout wings, we're stuck on this train whether we like it or not.'

‘There!' says Clementine, looking satisfied. ‘Good. I don't want to waste weeks of my life trekking through those mountains.' She shudders. ‘Imagine how cold it must be in the snow.'

As much as I hate feeling trapped, I find myself silently agreeing. I know all about the cruelty of winter. If we tried to hike through these mountains ourselves, with no food supplies and not even a foxary to carry our remaining packs, we'd be frozen dead in days.

Teddy doesn't look happy but after a few minutes' silence, he seems to accept the situation and brightens a little. ‘Hey, I wouldn't say no to a gourmet breakfast. Reckon I could bluff my way into the dining cart?'

‘I thought you were scared of being recognised,' says Clementine.

‘Yeah, but it'd be worth it. I bet they've got those fancy caviar rolls.'

I can't help smiling. If there's one thing I can rely on with Teddy Nort, it's his ability to find the best in a bad situation. Maybe it comes from too many years of getting stuck up richies' chimneys.

Unfortunately, this talk of breakfast has set my stomach grumbling. It reminds me of the days we were lost without food in the wilderness. In a way, this hunger feels even worse, because I
know
there's wonderful food nearby but I can't go near it. I close my eyes and lean into the packs, imagining the train's dining cart. There could be spicy potato wedges, perhaps, or bowls of steam­ing pumpkin soup . . . massive platters of deep-fried pastries and sugar puddings with syrup and cream . . . 

Maisy's stomach grumbles. She looks embarrassed, but I offer her a smile. ‘I know how you feel.'

To take our minds off the hunger, we decide to improve our richie disguises. Clementine digs through the packs to offer more stylish outfits, better coordinated than the rushed ensembles we threw ourselves into last night. Teddy selects a peacock waistcoat and I choose a gauzy veil to cover my face. Clementine tells me it's supposed to look ‘alluring', but I'm just happy to find a way to conceal my features. Since my face was plastered all over Gunning, the irritation of draping mesh across my eyes seems worthwhile.

Teddy holds up a pink satin sash with obvious distaste. ‘Why did you even
bring
all this junk?'

Clementine shakes her head, refusing to answer.

‘Our mother created all these clothes,' says Maisy. ‘She was a fashion designer.'

My breath catches in my throat. This is the first time I've heard the twins mention any family. Their wanted poster called them
‘daughters of a prominent businessman'
but that applies to almost every rich girl in Rourton.

‘Oh,' says Teddy.
‘Was?'