Page 180

“They won’t get within a mile,” he’d told her. “I’ll be here tomorrow. Ensure someone meets me.”

“And if you’re not here?” she’d called after him, desperation cracking her voice.

“Then I’m dead.” His words rebounded off the tunnel walls.

Now, he retraced the path back to Kenton. Baymouth was largely unguarded bar the artillery Kenton Hill had provided them with. They were surrounded by sea on one side, cornered on the cliffs. Easy to pick off. They’d been raided before and recovered. This latest desperate attempt by the House of Lords was not a prelude. And if it were, then they would find themselves with less limbs on the hills.

Kenton was safe. There was no way in but one.

And yet, Patrick’s blood pounded. The gas bulbs began to blur as he passed them.

He ran like a boy bolting from his shadow.

But no matter how fast he moved through that tunnel, Kenton seemed no closer. And he was certain, though he couldn’t see how it was possible, that through the walls he heard marching boots, the clack of artillery.

Miss Polly Prescott

To

RIGHT HONORABLE MASTER OF THE NATIONAL ARTISAN HOUSE

Lord Geoffry Tanner

My Lord,

I write this with the expectation that my remit in Kenton Hill be fulfilled, and that I seek safe return to Belavere City.

The Alchemist, Domelius Becker, is dead.

Passage into Kenton Hill can be found underground, using the map coordinates contained.

I urge the House of Lords to come to peace terms with the Union’s members, who I believe will agree to quick surrender rather than see their parish and its civilians suffer.

Polly Prescott

CHAPTER 64NINA

The window shuddered against my forehead.

I frowned at it, pressed my fingers to it as it shuddered again. It was minute. The smallest of disruptions. It wouldn’t have woken any who slept in their beds, or indeed, any who did not at that moment have their face mashed to the glass.

Over Main Street, the lamps on their wires trembled.

I opened the window, impervious to the icy draught, leaned my head out as far as I dared, looked one way, and then the other.

In my years of hiding, I’d learned this—war had an air to it. I felt it now. Tasted the copper on my tongue before the blood flowed. Birds fled their gutter perches, swarmed into the night.

Too late, I thought.Too fucking late.

My heart stuttered. Patrick… where was he?

I strained my sights to the hills as though I might find him there, his men preparing a defense as the army marched over them.

But the hills were shrouded in darkness. No firelight or sparks flashed in the dark. The hills did not shake.

But Kenton did. The lanterns swung precariously now, with no wind to blow them.

Then, there was a burst of sound.