A sharp, jagged pain flared in my temple as the wagon slammed into a tree root, nearly throwing me off the platform. The iron bridge was a mile behind us, a skeleton of wood and stone lost in the abyss, but the smell of burnt rubber and sulfur still clung to my skin like a second layer of filth. We were in the deep pines of the northern border, and the engine was no longer roaring—it was wheezing, a wet, rattling sound that told me the main gasket was seconds from melting into a puddle of lead.
"Stop the wagon, Alaric!" I croaked, my throat raw from the smoke. "The pressure's spiking! We're going to blow!"
Alaric didn't slow down. He stood on the driver's bench, his eyes fixed on the flickering torches appearing in the treeline ahead. Not cavalry. These torches were green-tinged, smelling of rot and chemical fuel.
"We stop, and the Scavengers take the iron," Alaric barked, his voice sounding like a rusted hinge. "I'd rather it blow than give it to them."
He's lost it. He's going to let us vaporize just so some mountain rats don't get his precious military tech.
The engine gave a sickening thwack. A plume of white steam erupted from the floorboards, scalding my ankles through my stockings. I let out a strangled yelp, my ears ringing as the heat filled the small cabin.
"Alaric! The valve!"
I lunged for the manual release, but the wagon lurched. A group of men in patchwork leather and rusted scrap-metal masks burst from the undergrowth. They didn't have lances. They had harpoons attached to thick, greasy chains.
One harpoon whistled through the air, thudding into the side of the wooden water tank. Water began to spray, a freezing jet that hissed against the red-hot boiler.
"Damn it!" Alaric ducked as a second harpoon shattered the front windshield. He grabbed the brake, skidding the heavy wagon to a halt just as a dozen shadows swarmed out of the trees.
We were surrounded. The engine hissed one final, pathetic breath and died.
A tall man stepped forward, his face hidden behind a mask made from a brass diving helmet. He carried a heavy, oversized wrench like a scepter. He looked at the smoking machine, then at Alaric, who had his sword out, and finally at me, shivering in the back with grease-stained hands.
"The Captain and the Witch," the man said, his voice muffled by the brass. "You crossed the bridge. Bold. Or stupid."
"Get back, Silas," Alaric warned, his blade steady despite the tremor in his shoulders. "This is Crown property."
"There is no Crown here, Veyron. Only the scrap." Silas pointed the wrench at the boiler. "The girl stays. The machine stays. You? You can walk back to the abyss."
My stomach dropped. The nausea came back in a cold, sweeping tide. They don't want the iron. They want the one who knows how to make it move.
Alaric shifted his weight, his back pressing against the seat. He didn't look at me. He looked at the harpoons aimed at his chest. I saw the calculation in his eyes—the cold, military logic that said one life was worth the mission.
"She's not a witch," Alaric said, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous vibration. "She's the architect. And she doesn't work for free."
"I don't pay in coin," Silas laughed.
"You'll pay in access," Alaric cut in. He turned slightly, his gaze finally hitting mine. It wasn't a look of protection anymore. It was a trade. "Elowen. Tell him. Tell him what happens if he touches that boiler without your permission."
I looked at Silas, then at the hissing, dying machine. I could see the stress fractures in the iron. If they tried to haul it away now, the residual heat would warp the pistons.
"It'll melt," I said, my voice shaking but loud. "The internal cooling cycle is manual. You move it, and you'll have a three-ton paperweight by morning."
Silas tilted his brass head. "Is that so?"
"She's the only one who can restart it," Alaric added, his hand reaching back to find mine in the dark. He squeezed my fingers—not a comfort, but a command. Play along. "You want the engine? You give us passage to the Iron Peaks. And you give her a full workshop. No guards. No chains."
"And what do you do, Captain?"
"I keep her alive," Alaric said, his grip on my hand tightening until I winced. "Because if a single hair on her head is harmed, I'll pull the pin on the main tank myself and turn this forest into a crater."
Silas went quiet. The scavengers shifted uneasily, their harpoon chains clinking in the dark. The tension was a physical pressure, a weight that made it hard to swallow.
"Temporary permission," Silas finally said, gesturing with the wrench. "To the Peaks. She fixes the scrap we found in the mines, and maybe I don't feed the Captain to the wolves."
Alaric didn't wait for a second offer. He hauled me down from the wagon, his arm wrapping around my waist as if he were claiming a prize. He didn't look at Silas. He looked at the dark path ahead.
"Go," Alaric whispered in my ear. "Don't look at them. Just move."
We were led into the heart of the scavenger camp—a sprawling, ugly mess of tents and rusted machinery built into the side of a mountain. It smelled of burnt oil and unwashed bodies. They threw us into a small, corrugated iron shed at the edge of the camp.
The door slammed shut, and Alaric immediately pinned me against the wall.
"What are you doing?" I hissed, my chest heaving. "You just sold me to a man in a diving helmet!"
"I bought us time!" Alaric's face was inches from mine, his eyes wild with a desperate, sharp light. "Harrington is still behind us. The cavalry will find a way across that canyon. Silas is the only one who knows the mountain tunnels."
"You used me as a bargaining chip!"
"I used what I had!" He grabbed my shoulders, his fingers digging into the silk of my gown. "You wanted to be an architect, Elowen? Well, here's your workshop. Fix their junk. Build whatever Silas wants. Just make sure you stay close to me."
"Why? So you can trade me again?"
I pushed him, my hands hitting the cold metal of his breastplate. I hated him for the coldness of the trade. I hated that he saw me as a tool, even after he'd kissed me on the ledge. The romance was a poison, a jagged thing that only hurt when I reached for it.
Alaric didn't pull back. He caught my wrists, slamming them against the iron wall above my head. The sound echoed through the shed.
"I'm trying to keep you from the stake!" he roared. "You think Silas is bad? The Church will peel the skin off your bones for that engine! If I have to let him think you're mine to give, then that's what I'll do."
"I'm not yours," I whispered, though my body was betraying me, leaning into the heat of his anger.
"You are as long as we're in this camp." He leaned down, his lips brushing the shell of my ear. "Because the second Silas thinks I don't control you, he'll realize he doesn't need me at all. And then I'm dead, and you're a slave in the mines. Is that what you want?"
I closed my eyes, the nausea swirling again. He's right. He's the only thing keeping the wolves away. But the cost is my soul.
"I hate you," I breathed.
"I know."
He let go of my wrists, but he didn't move away. He reached into his belt and pulled out a small, jagged piece of metal—a firing pin from the engine. He shoved it into my hand.
"They think you're fixing their machines," Alaric said, his voice a low, lethal rasp. "But you're going to build us a way out. And you're going to start tonight."
He walked toward the corner of the shed and sat down, his sword across his lap, watching the door like a gargoyle.
I looked at the firing pin. Then I looked at the pile of rusted gears and broken valves in the corner of the room. It wasn't a workshop. It was a graveyard of things that used to be whole.
I picked up a heavy mallet, my hand shaking.
I didn't start fixing their machines. I walked to the back wall of the shed, where the iron was thin and rusted through. I raised the mallet and struck the metal with a deafening clang.
"What are you doing?" Alaric demanded, half-rising.
"I'm following your order," I said, my voice cold and sharp as a razor. "I'm building."
I struck the wall again. And again. The sound was a rhythmic, violent declaration of war.
If Alaric wanted me to be his tool, I was going to be the loudest, most dangerous tool he'd ever held.
The door to the shed creaked open. Silas stood there, his brass helmet gleaming in the moonlight. He looked at the hole I was starting to make in the wall.
"The girl is loud," Silas noted.
"She's efficient," Alaric said, his voice steady as he settled back into the shadows.
Silas walked over to the workbench and dropped a heavy, leather-bound book in front of me. It wasn't a logbook. It was a collection of blueprints stolen from the Royal Academy—my father's blueprints.
My heart stopped. The ringing in my ears became a roar.
"Fix the Great Engine in the mine," Silas said, "and I'll give you the pages about the 'Red Key' your father hid."
I looked at the blueprints, then at Alaric. He didn't look surprised. He looked like a man who had known this was coming.
My father hadn't died in an accident. He'd been hunted.
And Alaric Veyron had been the one leading the hunt.