Dead Iron

Cedar waited for the footsteps. Waited for the stride. Waited for the hands to open the way to the boy, the way to his brother. Waited for Mr. Shunt.

A rattle of a hinge. The door on the matic swung open. Then bootheels scuffed down metal stairs. One set of boots was Shard LeFel’s; another set of boots shushed and smooth, almost without noise, belonged to Mr. Shunt. And the third set of footsteps was smaller, lighter than Shard LeFel’s. Who?

Cedar took a sniff, and caught the honey and flower scent of Mae Lindson. She was alive. But captured.

Rage pushed through him and the beast squirmed under his hold. Kill.

He bared his teeth, holding back a growl. They needed to be closer. They needed to open the door. Then they needed to die.

They said nothing as they hurried down the track, Shard LeFel’s cane clacking like a second hand ticking seconds into minutes along the dead iron rail.

Cedar counted footsteps. Three people. Counted scents. LeFel, Shunt, Mae. Mae was not bleeding, but he could smell her anger. And her fear.

Cedar could not suppress the sudden, livid anger at the thought of Mae in that monster’s hand. The beast inside twisted again with the rage of Mae’s capture. He pulled his muscles tight, ready to lunge. They walked up the stairs, Shard LeFel in the front, Mr. Shunt in the back, Mae Lindson between them.

Wait, the part of him that was a man commanded. Wait for the door to open.

Shard LeFel pulled a chain of keys out of a fold of cloth and unlocked the bolt on the door, but did not open it.

“Hurry, Mr. Shunt,” he said. “The moon will soon be at the end of its journey and I will have no time left.”

Mae Lindson gasped and stumbled up the stairs, pushed or pulled by her captors.

This. Now. The door. Run.

Cedar’s muscles pushed.

A flash of light burned against the southern sky, and the sound of something crashing through the trees rolled like thunder.

Shard LeFel paused at the door and swore in a language Cedar had never heard.

“The Madders,” he breathed. “I will not have the king’s dogs keep me from my passage. Go,” he commanded. “Kill them. I want their flesh in bits, and their bones crushed so fine they won’t fill a tobacco box.”

“And the matics?” Mr. Shunt asked.

“Yes, yes. Release them. All of them. But keep your Strangeworks near. Kill the Madders, kill Miss Small if she is fool enough to be with them, and kill every man and woman in the town if that is what it takes to keep them from my threshold this night.”

Rose Small?

Cedar growled so softly, it was almost too quiet for even his sharp ears to hear.

But Mr. Shunt paused, his boot soles scuffing the rocks and dirt. His body shifted with a subtle rub of fabric over metal and bone, oil and blood dripping into warm, soft folds of flesh and cloth as he bent to look under the railcar where Cedar crouched in shadow, eyes slit.

He had a prod in his hands. Just like the one that had wounded Cedar.

If Cedar leaped now, the door would remain closed. He would have no way to save Wil or Elbert.

If Cedar held still, Mr. Shunt walked free.

Both. He wanted the door open and Mr. Shunt dead.

Cedar held his breath and did not make a sound, though the tuning fork on his chest burned hot enough it felt like it was searing a hole through his fur. If he moved, he knew the fork would ring out. If he moved, he knew he would tear Mr. Shunt apart, lose all reason, and lose his chance to save Elbert and Wil.

Strange. The Strange who took the boy. Attack. Fight. Kill.

Cedar pushed back against that belly-deep need, his control of the beast slipping. He needed the door to the car open. Needed it as much as he needed Mr. Shunt’s neck in his jaws.

The open door would save Wil. Save Elbert. The open door would save Mae.

“Kill them,” Shard LeFel said. “Quickly, before the moon sets, or I will shatter the Holder, and the door for the Strange will remain closed forever.”

Mr. Shunt straightened, the whisper of wool and silk stroking his leather boot tops. Cedar could smell the hatred on him. The ever-so-slight whir of a spring coiling and uncoiling beneath those folds of cloth where only bone and blood and heart should be filled Cedar’s ears.

“Of course, Lord LeFel,” Mr. Shunt whispered. Mr. Shunt took a step away.

Cedar strained to hear the carriage door open.

But instead, a great noise roared out into the night. It didn’t sound quite human, but it was a voice, not quite a man’s, raised in a yell of pain, of fury.

Behind that voice was the ungodly screeching of iron bending, straining, breaking. Something was coming down the rail. Something was tearing up the rail. And whatever that creature was, it was surely coming this way.

“Go!” Shard LeFel hissed as he finally opened the door.

Cedar leaped out from beneath the carriage and crashed into Mr. Shunt, knocking him to the ground. He snapped at Shunt’s face, but the Strange snarled and blocked his jaws with one hand.

Cedar clamped down on the hand and twisted it, jerking back. Mr. Shunt screamed as his arm dislocated with a grinding pop. Cedar pulled harder and tore it the rest of the way off. Severed from the Strange, the arm still ticked and twitched, the gears and bones forcing the hand to open and close.

But that did not stop Mr. Shunt. He dashed backward so quickly, Cedar could not track his movement. Mr. Shunt stood several feet away and lifted a gun from his pocket. He pointed it at Cedar.

“Killer,” he hissed. “You will not stop us.”

Cedar growled and lunged.

Mr. Shunt’s lips split in a blackened grin filled with serrated teeth. He squeezed the trigger.

The impact threw Cedar backward. The bullet dug deep through his lung, taking the breath out of him and leaving behind pain. He landed hard, blacked out, and came to again, barely able to hold on to conscious thought. The bullet was still moving, digging through him like a beetle burrowing between his bones.

Cedar howled, anger and rage colliding in his mind and bringing him to his feet.

Mr. Shunt was gone. Shard LeFel and Mae were gone, locked up tight in the car.

He heard the middle train car door open. Water hissed over hot coals, and chains clattered from inside the car. Mr. Shunt must have been releasing the matics and tickers to protect the rail.

Cedar started toward the railcar, each step agony. He had to stop Mr. Shunt. He had to save Wil, Elbert, and Mae.

The night air punctured with the inhuman cry of rage and twisting metal that was coming up the track.

Cedar limped to the shadows near the train car, as half a dozen metal beasts, some as large as a bison, others small as fox, lumbered out of that car, puffing white and black plumes of steam into the air.

They were made of steel, iron, leather, wood, brass. They were made for pounding, tearing, cutting, stabbing, breaking. They were made to kill.

“Kill the Madders,” Mr. Shunt commanded from where he stood on the platform by the car door. “And every living thing with them.” The menagerie of matics ran, rolled, pounded down the rail, along the rail, running fast toward whatever bellowing creature was coming this way.

And then Mr. Shunt strode through the car to the last in line. Cedar pushed himself to follow, still clinging to the shadows. The bullet hadn’t exited his body. It rubbed and dug with every movement, every breath. But pain meant nothing.

Kill, the beast within him urged. Kill the Strange.

Behind Cedar in the car that held his brother, the child, and Mae, something moved. If he took the time to hunt Mr. Shunt, Shard LeFel might kill Wil, Elbert, and the beautiful Mae Lindson.

Cedar Hunt was not a man who hesitated in making decisions. And yet he paused, torn between the choice of killing or saving, the mind of man and the urge of beast locked in stalemate.

A gunshot rang out, breaking through his thoughts. He glanced over at the rail where bullets pinged and