Ironheart (11 page)

She blurted out her story in a disjointed, adrenalin-fuelled way, falling over herself and stammering, so that he made her take a deep breath and repeat it again more slowly. When she had
finished he asked her several questions, mostly about their meeting with Stone.

‘Well?’ said India after a pause. ‘What do you think?

‘What do I think? This is a non-stop train to Salekhard. I think we need to get you off now before you get into any further trouble, that’s what I think.’ She started to
protest but Bulldog was already leaning out of the window on the track side of the train. He was shocked to see Calculus’s head appear beneath the wheels. ‘Streuth!’ he
spluttered. ‘What’s he doing down there? I’m not supposed to be his dad too, am I?’

‘I would advise against trying to leave the train on this side, Captain,’ said Calculus. ‘The alleyways are swarming with Sid’s men and India would certainly be
seen.’

India was becoming agitated. ‘I’m not leaving the train on either side. I’ve told you both, I’m staying here, and nothing you say is going to stop me.’

‘Is that so?’ said Bulldog, folding his big arms. ‘Well, believe it or not, young lady, yours is not the only opinion that matters around here. All I want to do is get back to
The Beautiful Game
and now I’m stuck with a runaway girl and an enormous android!’ Any further conversation was silenced by a blast from the guard’s whistle. ‘Oh,
that’s just great,’ said Bulldog, throwing up his arms in despair.

The engine snorted like an awakening horse and the train took up the slack along its length with a clanking jolt. Calculus ducked quickly beneath the carriage. The steam heart of the beast began
to shunt them forward and thick coils of vapour enveloped the station.

But as the train picked up speed, the lumbering figure of Cripps appeared at the window, puffing to keep pace with the carriage and peering in through the glass. He caught sight of India and
opened his mouth to shout out but failed to notice the signal post that stood at the end of the platform and ran headlong into it with a resounding smack.

Bulldog winced as he pulled down the blind and their carriage passed the end of the platform. He blew out a long breath and slumped heavily into one of the worn plush seats. ‘Well,’
he said with a sigh, ‘we might as well get comfortable. We’re here for the ride now.’

With her head pounding, Verity Brown awoke on a bed of fresh linen in a comfortable room furnished with antiques and expensive fixtures. She reached instinctively for her gun
but her holster was empty. When she tried to sit up she found her other wrist was handcuffed to the bed.

The earlier part of the evening came back hazily. Stone had been on his best behaviour over drinks, but then what had happened? She remembered feeling dizzy and getting up to leave and then,
blackness. Drugged, she guessed, but why?

She turned her attention to the handcuffs. They were slightly loose. She worked her wrist around in the steel bracelet, trying to twist it over the malleable bones of her hand. This would not be
a painless escape, she thought. She was still twisting her hand when the door rattled and swung open. An armed guard loomed briefly in the doorway and then Stone rolled into the room like a great
troll.

‘I trust you’re feeling refreshed after your sleep, Mrs Brown,’ he said. He sat down on a delicate antique chair that looked like it would burst under his weight and leaned
forward on his heavy walking stick.

‘I feel like hell,’ said Verity. ‘What did you do to me?’

‘I’m sorry about that. I know it’s bad manners to drug a dinner guest but I was never much good at manners.’ He paused to pick his nose. ‘Besides,’ he said,
examining the end of his finger, ‘I couldn’t take the chance you would really go to the Chinese.’

Verity struggled to work her hand free behind her back.

‘Are you all right, Mrs Brown? You look like you’re in pain.’

‘Just the company I have to keep,’ she said sweetly.

Stone laughed. ‘You remind me of my fourth wife, Mrs Brown. She never knew when to keep her mouth shut either!’

‘So would that have been Sid’s mother?’

He raised his eyebrow in surprise. ‘Ah! Very good. She was my true love, Mrs Brown. It damn near broke my heart when I had to kill her. The least I could do under the circumstances was
bring up the boy.’ He gave her a nasty smile. ‘You, however, I couldn’t care less about, so you can only imagine what I will to do to you if you don’t give me what I
want.’

‘I would have sold you the information about Ironheart. There was no need to kidnap me.’

‘Unfortunately, Mrs Brown, I couldn’t wait any longer for this particular nugget of information. If my rigs don’t leave for Ironheart immediately then the hard winter snows
will block the eastern valleys and we will not reach it before next spring. My rigs are fully fuelled and ready to leave at first light. I need that information, Mrs Brown and I need it
now!’

‘What’s at Ironheart that you want so desperately?’ Her wrist was almost free now. ‘It can’t be the money; you already have more of that than you could ever
spend.’

‘Power, Mrs Brown,’ he said. ‘Enough power to make the Trans-Siberian Company the dominant force over half the globe! When I first heard the legend of Ironheart I dismissed it
as a fairy tale. But then my spies discovered something that made me change my mind. The original government records of Ironheart from before the rains, documenting everything that had been stored
there. It made
fascinating
reading.’ His eyes glittered. ‘Ironheart is everything you think it is, Mrs Brown. There is enough treasure to satisfy the greediest pirate, but
there is much more. The men who built it chose it as the place to store their greatest achievements. I’m talking about weapons, Mrs Brown, old-world weapons of horrific purity. Missiles that
can lay waste to entire cities, chemicals that will shroud the land in poison gas and diseases for which the cure would only be available to the highest bidder. All of these toys lie hidden at
Ironheart – can you imagine what fun I will have with them?’

Verity swallowed. Looking into the crazed features of Lucifer Stone, she could imagine it very well. ‘I’d love to help, Mr Director, really I would,’ she said as her hand
slipped suddenly free of the cuff. ‘But I make it a policy not to do business with anyone who is madder than a box of frogs.’

She lunged across the bed at Stone. Ordinarily she would have overpowered him in seconds but, weakened by the drugs, she stumbled. Stone swiftly recovered his wits and struck her hard on the
temple with his stick. Pain and lights exploded behind her eyes as she crashed to the floor.

The guard was in the room in an instant, hauling her to her feet and applying a second pair of handcuffs tightly behind her back. Her injured hand screamed in protest.

‘Now, tell me!’ yelled Stone, his face only inches from hers. ‘What was in John Bentley’s message?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Verity between gritted teeth.

Stone made a noise like a wild animal in pain. ‘Clearly you don’t appreciate how serious I am, Mrs Brown, so let me make you my final offer. Tell me the location of Ironheart and I
promise not to feed you into my furnaces, feet first.’

‘You can yell all you want,’ said Verity defiantly, ‘but that information is encrypted and I don’t know what it says.’

Stone narrowed his eyes and stroked his beard thoughtfully. ‘Well, if you don’t have it then it must be with the girl and your metal man. Yes, that’s it, isn’t it? The
girl has the message and now she and that metal man have gone to try and find Ironheart themselves.’

There was silence for a moment, then Verity began to laugh. Stone looked appalled. ‘What? Why are you laughing?’

‘You mean they’ve escaped?’ said Verity, still grinning. ‘I’d say that was pretty careless of you. Calculus is a military droid with full stealth capabilities. Once
they get out of the city you’ll never track them down.’

Stone glowered at her. The veins stood out on his forehead and there were flecks of spittle on his lips. ‘Don’t underestimate me, Mrs Brown. I have spies everywhere. Miss Bentley and
that rusty machine won’t stop my plans. Things will just take a little longer, that’s all.’ He turned to the guard. ‘Mrs Brown is unable to assist us further. Please take
her up to the roof and use the catapult to fling her body into the city streets. If she survives the fall, then drag her back to the roof and keep doing it until the job is done!’

The guard yanked brutally on the cuffs, causing Verity to cry out.

‘Wait!’ she said as they reached the door. She took a deep breath. ‘There may be something I can help you with after all.’

The
Tolstoy
picked up a gallop and plunged into the night, leaving the lights of Angel Town behind. There was a small wood stove in the compartment that didn’t
quite take the dry chill from the air and Bulldog stoked it hopefully, sending sparks and resin smells into the carriage.

‘Well,’ he said when India had finished her story. ‘Sid’s friends are a dangerous bunch and now they’re very interested in you. So what are you going to do
now?’

India hesitated. Her plans had not extended much further than getting on the train, but now she thought about it, she was clear on the first priority. ‘We have to find Ironheart,’
she said. ‘If we can get to it before Stone we can find my dad and maybe even use the treasure to bargain for Verity’s life.’

‘Whoa, whoa!’ Bulldog raised his hands. ‘What do you mean, “we”? Don’t include me in your plans.
The Beautiful Game
leaves for the southern oil
fields tomorrow. The water’s lovely and warm down there and the crew are looking forward to it.’ He caught India’s pained expression. ‘Look,’ he said kindly, ‘you
have no idea where Ironheart is, so why don’t you forget all about it and focus on how you’re going to get back to London? Mrs Brown is a resourceful woman, she can take care of
herself.’

‘But I know the region where my dad was looking for Ironheart. Verity said it was called Uliu-something-or-other. And when Calculus deciphers the message on my pendant then I bet
it’ll tell us exactly where to find it. Most probably.’

Bulldog reached in his satchel and fished out two huge sandwiches, handing one to India. ‘It’s called Uliuiu Cherchekh,’ he said. ‘It means “The Valley of
Death” and it’s over fifteen hundred miles from here. How exactly do you think you’re going to travel that distance, on your own, in winter?’ He took a bite from his
sandwich that would have choked a horse.

‘You’re a pirate rigger, aren’t you?’ she said matter-of-factly. ‘You could take me.’

Bulldog spluttered breadcrumbs across the carriage. ‘Take you? Fifteen hundred miles is the maximum range of my rig with a full fuel load. We’d get there all right, but then
we’d be stuck on the ice until we froze to death or until Stone caught up with us. Forget it, India.’

She wasn’t about to give up. ‘But you
could
get us there and back. There are pirate oil refineries out on the tundra where you can buy fuel if you know where to find them.
It’s called “long rigging”, Mrs Chang told me all about it.’

‘Oh, did she now? And did Mrs Chang tell you what it’s like to be down to your last hundred litres of diesel with a blizzard closing in? Or how to stay on the trail during a
white-out or any one of a thousand other things that can go wrong when you take liberties with the Siberian winter?’

‘No, she didn’t,’ said India. ‘But you know how to do those things and I know how to find Ironheart. So I know you’ll do it because that’s what pirates do,
isn’t it? They look for treasure!’ She took a bite of her sandwich.

Bulldog squinted at her, impressed by the raw passion that came spilling out of this girl. However crazy this journey might sound she certainly seemed to have enough steel in her backbone to
survive it. He weighed the risks involved. If they ran into one of the heavily armed Company rigs in the ice forests, that would almost certainly be fatal. But Bulldog knew all about
risk
and how it often went arm in arm with its more attractive sister,
profit.
If Stone wanted something this badly then you could be sure there was money in it. Then, of course, there was the
girl’s pendant. That might just be the thing that tipped the balance in their favour.