Land of Hope and Glory (9 page)

‘Yes, about twenty of them,’ a tall Rajthanan man said. ‘They came out of the hills on horseback and threw some sort of bomb at the engine. There was a huge explosion. The train carried on for a few more miles after that, thankfully. I don’t know what would have happened if we’d had to stop right there.’

‘What did they look like, these men?’ Sengar asked.

‘Just filthy Europeans,’ the woman said. ‘Peasants.’

‘I didn’t get a good look at them,’ the man said. ‘But yes, just peasants, that’s all. There was one man with them, though . . . a tall brute with a shaved head. He seemed to be their leader. It looked as though he was shouting at them and ordering them about at any rate.’

Sengar shot a look at Jack, who was still sitting astride his mare.

Jack tried to read Sengar’s expression. Was he supposed to recognise William from that description?

But Sengar said nothing and looked back at the Rajthanans. ‘Do you know where the driver is?’

‘Somewhere up there, I think.’ The Rajthanan man pointed towards the smouldering engine.

‘Right,’ Sengar replied. ‘Wait here a moment.’

Sengar ordered two cavalrymen to remain as guards, then mounted his horse and led the party towards the head of the train. Hundreds of European passengers had spread out along the tracks. Some were wealthy merchants or officials in fur-trimmed cloaks and feathered caps, but most were poorer and would have been crowded into third class with standing room only. People were beginning to give up on the train ever starting again and were drifting away towards the road, dragging heavy sacks and boxes along with them.

Jack caught a waft of sattva and felt a familiar ripple across his skin. The railway line, as was common, followed a strong stream – it meant the avatars could run faster and with less coal.

The smell grew stronger as the dark shape of the engine appeared ahead in the smoke and steam. Two figures stood nearby, indistinct in the haze.

Sengar paused and called out, ‘Where’s the driver?’

One of the figures waved his arm in a broad stroke. ‘Over here.’

Sengar glanced back, then snorted and shook his head.

When Jack looked over his shoulder he saw that the French were several feet behind, muttering and dithering. Sergeant Lefevre peered nervously into the steam and scowled when he noticed Jack watching him. No doubt he believed sattva and avatars were the work of Shaitan.

‘You stay here,’ Sengar said to the French. ‘Kansal, Casey, come with me.’

Sengar, Kansal and Jack dismounted, left their horses with the cavalrymen and walked into the sooty mist. The black, lobster-like train avatar loomed over them, hissing and steaming within the casing of the engine carriage. Its claws, stalks and feelers drooped towards the ground and the only sign of movement was the slight, irregular back and forward motion of a piston on its side.

The driver wore a blue tunic, smeared grey with coal dust and oil, and a partially unravelled turban. He had the dark-olive skin of a Gypsy or half-caste – the only two groups who would work for the railway service. His eyes were red-rimmed and watery. ‘It’s terrible, sirs, terrible.’

His colleague, also in railway-service uniform, nodded.

‘She won’t move, can’t move.’ The driver dabbed at his eyes with his sleeve. ‘Reckon she won’t live much longer.’

‘Where’s the damage?’ Sengar asked.

The driver nodded and took them around to the other side of the avatar.

‘Big engine,’ Kansal said over the sound of the steam. ‘Never seen one that size.’

‘They grow large in England,’ Sengar replied. ‘Strong sattva.’

Jack had often heard this said about England. His homeland apparently had some of the strongest streams of sattva in the world – stronger than the rest of Europe, or even India.

As they crossed the tracks, the avatar gave a deep growl that Jack felt through the soles of his boots. Its legs scratched at the ground and it bucked, lifting the front of the engine carriage up a few feet.

Jack and the others flinched, but the driver raised his hands before the beast and called out, ‘Down. Down.’

The creature groaned, then settled back on to the tracks with a crunch. Although the driver was clearly no siddha, he obviously knew the creature well enough to control it.

‘She’s hurt,’ the driver explained. ‘Never done that before.’

Once they reached the other side of the train, the driver stopped and pointed. ‘Look what they done to her. Poor beauty.’

A large hole had been wrenched in the side of the avatar, leaving a mess of twisted and half-melted metal. A black substance, thick as honey, oozed out of the wound, as well as rising streams of smoke. The heat of the engine pressed against Jack’s face. The smell of sattva overpowered him and made his eyes water.

‘Was it the Ghost?’ Sengar asked

‘I wouldn’t know,’ the driver said. ‘No one knows what he looks like.’

‘Who else could it have been?’

‘Well, now that you say it, no one else, I wouldn’t think.’

Sengar’s moustache tightened, then unfurled. He turned to Jack. ‘Could you pick up the trail from where the train was hit?’

Jack blinked. He went to reply, then stopped himself. Now that it came to it, he realised just how much he didn’t want to do it, didn’t want to betray his old friend.

‘Well, can’t you speak?’ Sengar said.

Jack tensed. In his mind he was getting out the knife and running at Sengar. ‘Yes.’ His voice was thick. ‘I could track them from there.’

‘Good.’ Sengar fixed his eyes on Jack for a moment. Then he turned back to the driver. ‘How far away were you when you were attacked?’

‘About ten miles,’ the driver replied. ‘My beauty managed to keep going all the way to here, bless her, getting slower and slower.’

‘Ten miles – that’s in the Earl’s lands.’

‘That’s right, sir. The line crosses the border for a distance.’

Sengar looked at Kansal. ‘Ten miles isn’t far.’

‘We could follow the tracks there now,’ Kansal said.

‘But there’s still the damn protocol. We should have an audience with the Earl first.’

‘Is it necessary, sir?’

‘Things could get difficult if we don’t at least go through the motions. These pathetic little lords can make a fuss. No, we’ll go to Pentridge first. It’s in the same direction as the train line anyway. We’ll pick up the trail tomorrow.’ Sengar smirked, his moustache coiling even higher than usual. ‘Looks as though the Ghost has given us quite a gift. A fresh trail. We’ll have him in no time.’

4

T
hey rode between the hills at a steady trot, dust rising from the horses’ hooves. As before, Jack was behind Sengar and Kansal, with the French bringing up the rear.

They’d crossed into the Earl’s lands three hours earlier and since that time the narrow, winding, poorly maintained road had hampered their pace. Added to this, they’d lost an hour at the train arranging for carts to be sent from Fern Down to rescue the stranded Rajthanans. Now the late afternoon shadows were pooling in the valleys and gullies and they still hadn’t reached the Earl’s castle.

Jack gazed at the rolling countryside – the scene in the native fiefdom was quite different from the Rajthanan-controlled lands to the south. The farms were mostly smallholdings with ramshackle huts and barns. The few hedgerows were unkempt and wild. There were patches of dense forest and heaths that seemed never to have been cultivated. He often saw small shrines on the hilltops, their simple stone crosses dark against the white cloud.

This landscape was familiar, yet also strangely unfamiliar. It was twenty years since he’d last visited a native state. He’d been born in Shropshire, but since his parents had died he’d hardly been back. The years had created a distance.

The people lived a simple life here, working the land and following the old feudal laws, a life that had changed little during the hundred years of Rajthanan rule. Or the two hundred years of the Moorish Caliphate, for that matter. And it struck him now in a way it never had before: this way of life hadn’t changed for century after century, going all the way back to the time of the ancient Normans, and even before . . .

Rounding a corner, they approached a village that clung to a slope. The cottages were crumbling and the walls of the tiny stone church were cracked, worn and swarming with vines.

Villagers in tattered clothes appeared on the side of the road. They were thin – far too thin – and many had hollow eyes and grey skin. Women hugged babies, old men watched with quivering lips, younger men stared with eyes that glinted with defiance.

‘Food,’ some shouted as Jack clattered past.

Jack shivered and tried to ignore them. He’d heard the crops had been blighted in many states, and the mutiny had only made things worse.

A small boy darted out into the road, his hands outstretched, his face dirty and his feet bare. ‘Please, sir,’ he shouted.

Jack yanked at the reins, swerved to avoid the lad, then spurred his horse on. He wanted to get away from these people and their cries.

Soon he was out of the crowd, the village disappearing around the corner of the road.

Throughout the afternoon they passed further hamlets where thin and ragged people shuffled out to beg for food. In one village a baby wailed so loudly Jack could hear its cry on the wind even after he’d left it far behind.

It was dusk when Pentridge Castle came into view, its stone walls and towers rising from the summit of a squat, dome-shaped hill. As they rode up the path, Jack could see that in many places the battlements were crumbling and the ageing spires were riddled with holes. The moat appeared to have long been empty of water and was now little more than a ditch overgrown with grass. The drawbridge was down, but the portcullis was closed.

Sengar called up to the guard tower, ‘I am Captain Rajesh Sengar of the Maharaja’s European Army. I request an immediate audience with the Earl of Dorsetshire.’

At first there was no sign that the tower was even occupied, but then a guard with long, lank hair bent out of a window and peered down. ‘It’s late. You’ll need to come back tomorrow.’

‘Open the gate. I demand to see the Earl immediately.’

‘The Earl isn’t . . . available.’

Sengar’s moustache rolled across his top lip. ‘You will open this gate or I will return with a larger force and raze this castle to the ground.’

The guard rubbed his eyes. ‘I understand, sir. Wait a moment.’

The guard disappeared and left them waiting for at least ten minutes. Sengar muttered to Kansal in Rajthani – Jack could just make out various curses and expletives.

Finally the portcullis rattled up and the guard stood before them, bowing and saying, ‘Namaste.’ Stable hands admitted them into a courtyard and took their horses.

The guard escorted Sengar, Kansal, Jack and five cavalrymen down corridors lit by infrequent lanterns and sputtering torches. Faded, moth-eaten tapestries lined the walls. Statues of knights and heroes from antiquity flickered in gloomy alcoves.

The audience chamber was better lit and had pale walls leading up to a distant ceiling. The Earl sat on a carved wooden throne at the far end of the room. To either side of him stood guards in old chain mail and courtiers in long robes embroidered with gold. The Earl himself was a short man, almost too small for his chair, with a large fleshy head and red cheeks. He wore bits of what appeared to be ancient plate armour – a breastplate, greaves and a single gauntlet – but the pieces were ill-fitting and the steel discoloured. He slumped to one side and perspired heavily. Above his head hung a banner displaying the family crest: two leopards about a shield.

Sengar and Kansal walked across the room, the sound of their boots echoing.

‘Namaste, Lord Dorsetshire,’ Sengar said. ‘I have been sent here by order of the Raja of Poole and the Maharaja’s Army in Europe.’

‘Greetings, Captain.’ The Earl’s speech was slurred and he moved his hand listlessly, as if tossing something aside. He appeared to be drunk.

‘I request leave to pass through your lands in search of a band of renegades led by the man known as the Ghost. We believe these rebels are hiding in the hills under your jurisdiction. You are also requested to afford me all possible assistance in bringing the Ghost to justice.’