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Alchemy and Dead Bodies (to be changed)
Chapter I: Departure at Platform Thirteen
The train platform bustled with life, the air alive with the chatter of departing passengers, the clang of baggage carts, and the occasional sharp hiss of steam from the waiting engine. Lydia Carrington stood near the edge, her valise at her feet and her gloves clutched tightly in her hands. She was doing her best to keep her nerves at bay, though the energy of the platform wasn’t helping.
Professor Alcott stood beside her, a stout man with a wiry beard that wavered gently in the breeze. His well-worn coat bore faint traces of chalk along the cuffs and his hat, slightly askew, betrayed his hurry to reach the station in time.
“I still say,” he said with a tone a mixture of affection and concern, “that heading out to Fallowcrest for a teaching post is an… ambitious choice.”
“Father says it is where I was born,” Lydia replied with a faint smile. “He didn’t want me going back either, but I think I’d still like to see it for myself. He won’t speak of it, you know. When I received the letter stating a position opened up at Eldermoor Academy, it seemed like kismet. I had to take it.”
Alcott gave Lydia a sidelong look. “Fallowcrest has a reputation, you know. They say it is unsettled.”
“Unsettled?” Lydia said, finding herself incensed at the disrespect toward her birthplace. She had never been there, but she was technically from there, even if she had moved from Fallowcrest before turning one year old. “The letter said Eldermoor maintained a student body of over three thousand. Residents of the city number over ten thousand. It isn’t a bustling metropolis like Nova Aurelia, but it is hardly unsettled.”
Alcott gave a good-natured chuckle, shaking his head lightly. “Not that definition of the word, my dear,” he said. “Some of my colleagues have passed through there on their way to Nova Caelum. They speak of strange happenings. Clock towers that chime at odd hours, machinery that moves on its own, hotels with no windows, and people who…” He hesitated, looking Lydia up and down. “Well, let’s just say people who don’t seem quite right. Not you, of course. I’m sure the majority are fine peoples. It’s just—”
“Every town has its stories,” Lydia said with a tired sigh. She had heard similar things, of course. It seemed like everyone knew someone who had been there, but no one had been there themselves. “It will be fine. I’ll be fine.”
The professor mirrored her sigh, nodding politely. “I hope you’re right. You’ve got a bright future, Lydia. Your theories in mechanized alchemy could be revolutionary. I hate to see a place like that tarnish your abilities.”
Lydia waved him off. For as much as she respected her mentor, this was at least the third such time they had run around these tracks since she sent in her acceptance of the Fallowcrest posting. If she were being frank, she was glad to finally be leaving, if only to avoid this kind of discussion for the foreseeable future.
Fallowcrest couldn’t be as bad as everyone said. No one would live there otherwise.
She shook her head, nervously fiddling with a small locket around her neck. At the same time, she would be lying if she were to say that the stories weren’t getting to her. Since accepting the position, she kept feeling odd things. Her imagination, to be sure, but still.
For instance, her attention snagged on an unusual man at the far end of the platform. A man in a dark overcoat who stood perfectly still, as if someone had wheeled out a coatrack and threw a wide hat on its top, pulled low to hide its true identity. What few members of the crowd passed him did so without acknowledgment.
A porter passed by, pushing a cart stacked high with brass-banded trunks, momentarily obscuring the hatted man from view. When the cart rolled on, the space where he stood was empty.
Lydia shook her head, rubbing her thumb over her locket. You’re just tired, she told herself. Tired and stressed from all the bellyaching over Fallowcrest.
A whistle pierced the air, signaling the train’s arrival and making Lydia hop in place despite herself. The engine rolled in, a sleek and black monstrosity with copper-plated wheels that glinted in the afternoon sun. Gouts of steam billowed from its underside, curling through the air like restless spirits. It carried only a dozen passenger carriages, each matching the engine’s polished aesthetics.
The movement on the platform paused momentarily as the crowd looked to the train, but as it squeaked to a stop, only a half-dozen of the crowd actually boarded upon the call going out. The rest must have been waiting for the next train. Lydia moved forward, pulling her own valise to increase that number by one, only to pause as she felt the professor’s hand on her arm.
“Are you certain about this?” Alcott asked, one more time. The look in his eyes was steely but worried.
“Yes,” Lydia said, straightening her back as she gave her firm answer.
Alcott studied her face for a moment before nodding his head, sorry and grave. “Very well. Write me, will you? And stay safe.”
“I will,” Lydia said.
She hurried along the side of the lead carriage before Professor Alcott could try to stop her yet again. The windows on the carriage gleamed like darkened mirrors, seeming to reflect everything but the sun. For a brief, disquieting moment, she thought she saw her own reflection looking back at her out of the corner of her eye—only the reflection didn’t move with her, it stayed in place. When she paused to look, everything appeared normal.
“Fallowcrest?” the conductor at the entry asked, a tall thin man with a mechanical watch chained to his pocket that ticked louder than it should have. He tipped his cap to her as she stepped up.
“Indeed,” she said, swiftly pulling the ticket from her own dark lavender waistcoat.
He barely glanced at it before waving her on. “Good luck,” he said. “You’ll need it.”
“Oh—” Lydia started, feeling cross after the repeated warnings about the town. “Bother,” she finished, deciding that she just didn’t care. Not about some random person’s opinions.
At least the conductor was a gentleman despite his irritating well-wishing. He helped carry her luggage over the small gap onto the train.
Inside, the air was warm and heavy with the faint metallic tang of steam. Gas lamps flickered overhead, their glow just a shade too dim for her liking. Lydia moved along the narrow aisle between rows of seats, once again in control of her valise. Despite the low number of boarders, the train had more than a few people occupying the compartment who must have already been on board.
That served to reassure Lydia. So many people wouldn’t head toward Fallowcrest if it was truly such a dreadful place.
Knowing—and having experienced—the folly of choosing the wrong travel partner for long journeys, Lydia had paid in advance for a private compartment aboard the carriage at the front of the train. A good thing too. There was hardly a seat empty in the public portion of the carriage and the few seats open were adjacent to questionable sorts. A farmer-type carrying an overlarge boar grinned at her as she made her way past. A man wearing more dirt than clothes lay slumped against one window with a heavy haze of alcohol about him. One handsome gentleman looked mostly agreeable, even drawing Lydia’s eyes for a long moment, until she noticed the lecherous leer on his face.
If it were mere lust, she might have ignored it. A male-dominant profession like hers, for better or worse, mostly inundated her to such looks. But his eyes held a glint of something more dangerous. With a shudder, fiddling with her locket, Lydia kept moving on, ignoring the few other open seats. This was to be a several hour journey, lasting well into the night, and the sooner she got to her compartment, the better.
Stopping at the compartment listed on her ticket, she frowned and peered through the window.
It was occupied.
Two men sat side-by-side. One larger man in a worn blue suit. He wore a slim bolo tie and tan Stetson more popular out in the West. The thinner man further into the compartment dressed more congruous with the city with his crisp gray pinstripe suit, three-piece of course, and a stylish homburg hat. The latter noticed Lydia at the window and quirked a corner of his lips into a smile, offering a friendly wink.
Friendly as it was, the men were in her compartment. “Excuse me,” she said, sliding open the door, “but I think you—”
The older of the two jolted in his seat, he reached for the inside of his suit jacket before his eyes found hers. Once he saw her, he paused and merely donned a frown. “Woah, lady. You can’t be here.”
“I beg your pardon? This is my—”
A light clearing of a throat had Lydia whipping her head to find the conductor standing at her side. She hadn’t even noticed his approach. “My apologies,” he said, removing his cylindrical cap in sincerity. “I neglected to mention that we had a last-minute prisoner transfer to accommodate.”
“Prisoner?” Lydia said, snapping her head back to the compartment.
The well-dressed man grinned, waving a hand at Lydia. A shiny steel bracelet chained his wrist to a fixture on the wall.
“We can’t have anybody in here other than us,” the older man said, not sounding apologetic in the slightest. He got to his feet, letting Lydia clearly see the five-pointed marshal badge pinned to his chest.
“We?” the prisoner said, still smiling at Lydia even as the marshal reached for the door. “Speak for yourself. A little company would liven—”
The sliding compartment door shut with a harsh slam, dampening the conversation. The marshal glared at her through the window for a moment longer before moving back to his seat. The prisoner pressed himself back in his seat to see around the marshal, giving Lydia another wink. Her eyes lingered on his steely eyes before she finally turned back to the conductor.
“I apologize,” he said again. “All our compartments are full. However,” he said, pulling out his overly loud pocket watch before she could complain. “Our next stop will be in one half of an hour, two compartments should empty then. If you can bear with the public seating for just a short while…”
Lydia pressed her lips together in a silent huff. She thought to argue, to complain, but there was little that doing so would accomplish aside from wasting her breath. The compartments were full-up and that wasn’t going to change with or without her words. Unless she wished to wait for the next train and miss her appointment with the dean of Eldermoor Academy—not a good look to the beginning of her tenure as a professor—she had little choice.
“Shall I assist in finding you a new seat?”
Looking back up the narrow aisle, Lydia sighed. It wasn’t like she had a plethora of options. She noted all the vacancies on her way in as a matter of habit. Speaking of habit… “No, thank you,” she said, her politeness straining.
“Very well. Please take a seat, you appear to be our final boarder so any open one will do. We shall be departing shortly.” The conductor turned tail and stalked back down the aisle toward the locomotive’s engine, taking that loud ticking with him.
A disappointed Lydia watched him go, threw one last look to the prisoner in the compartment, then turning back to the public seating. A woman sat right at the front with her back straight and her eyes closed. She had light blonde hair and a darker tan skin tone. With her black uniform with a white cloth down the front, Lydia thought she was a woman of the cloth. The bright red ribbon she wore around her waist, cinching her dress—which stopped just above the knee—made that assertation suspect, but she carried a Book of Cogitation.
Coggists liked to hear themselves talk. The only thing they liked more than hearing themselves talk was the misery of everyone around them who had to listen to them talk.
For a half hour, she could put up with that. At least the woman wasn’t holding a pig or liable to choke her out with a cloud of dirt.
“Is this seat taken?” Lydia asked, gesturing across from the woman. “Would you mind if I took it?”
The pious woman opened her bloodshot eyes, staring at Lydia with an intensity that made her shuffle where she stood. Thick black eyeliner dripped down the upper parts of her cheeks. Had she been crying recently?
A spark of guilt hit Lydia. She always judged people too early, including this woman. Working herself up over the woman based on nothing more than her black and white clothes…
The woman slowly shook her head after following Lydia’s gesturing arm.
“Mind if I take it?”
Again, she shook her head.
As demure as possible, Lydia tucked her valise underneath the seat before sitting atop it. There wasn’t much room between them. The cramped benches were clearly designed for capacity over comfort. Maneuvering her luggage into position made her ears heat up in embarrassment.
The woman watched her the whole time with wide, observant eyes.
Half hour, Lydia thought, trying to console herself as the sharp departure whistle sounded. The sudden lurch of its movement knocked Lydia forward, almost making her headbutt the poor mourner.
“I’m Lydia,” she said, hoping to ease the awkward atmosphere with a friendly smile. While she hoped to avoid a lecture, politeness cost her nothing. “Lydia Carrington.”
The woman leaned forward, opening her mouth. She leaned forward a little more, then a little more, well into Lydia’s personal space. “I’m high as an airship,” she said, slurring. A small worry crossed her features. “My state is… regrettable,” she said, still slurring. “I shan’t impose upon you again.” Donning a satisfied smile, she leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes once again.
Lydia slow blinked, wafting her hand in front of her face. She could smell the earthy, musky scent on the woman’s breath. “Ah,” she said, turning to look out the window.
Professor Alcott stood on the slowly shrinking platform, waving his hat at the departing train. She waved back, not that he would see her behind the semi-mirrored glass. It was more a personal thing. Despite problems already cropping up before she had even left, Lydia wouldn’t be deterred. Fallowcrest will be a good experience, she thought, pulling her locket out. A flick of her thumb opened the polished silver casing. She looked down at the aged, yellowed photograph within, using it to firm her convictions.
“Cute couple. Your boyfriend? Ah, husband?”
Lydia wrinkled her nose at that earthy scent filling her nostrils. She looked up to find the woman leaning forward once again, her bloodshot eyes locked on the locket.
“My grandparents,” Lydia said with a scoff. “On my mother’s side.” As if that would matter to the woman.
Her grandfather wore a fine suit and bowtie with a slick black topper on his head while her grandmother, standing next to him with his arm around her waist, was dressed in a fine, flower-print bodice with a frilly white undershirt. Dressed to the nines as they were, complete with flutes of champaign, one could be forgiven for thinking they were at a marriage ceremony.
“I apologize for my sorry state,” the woman said, leaning back in her seat once more. “I shan’t impose myself upon you any longer.”
Lydia twitched her lips in an attempt at a smile. It didn’t reach her eyes. Or her cheeks. Or her lips. She was about to close her locket and return it to where it normally sat on her chest when a thick leather glove clamped down around her wrist. She tugged back, only to find herself locked in a grip as firm as a mechanist’s vice.
“S. M. A.” the Coggist said, squinting at the design on the front of the locket—the Carrington family crest. Leaning forward, her eyes focused on the picture held within. “Is that… quintessence?”
Sucking in a sharp breath of drug-tinged air, Lydia flicked her eyes downward.
Her grandparents stood in front of an old chalkboard, clearly celebrating despite the dour looks on their faces. Behind them, peaking out just over the tops of their shoulders, alchemic formulae were scrawled over the black surface in a big, round hand. At the top, one of the nine principal goals of alchemy, the symbol for quintessence sat at the business end of a formation glyph.
Unfortunately, the important parts of the glyph were hidden behind the two.
Lydia found herself staring at the maid. “You know alchemy?” she asked, tentatively interested. Alchemy, the mutation of the Grand Machine, was against Coggist principles and was considered an affront to the Cogitation Engine. More than once in her five years at Nova Aurelia University, she had to shove past Coggist protestors to get to her classes.
The woman chuckled, wobbling forward in her seat far enough that Lydia had to push her back. “Dabbled. Give me a bottle of alcohol and a Hermetic Engine and I’ll give you little bags of the four base elements.”
That had Lydia raising an eyebrow. Elemental separation was well beyond the abilities of a dabbler. Such principles weren’t often taught until the third year.
“O’course, can’t be blamed if some of that alcohol goes missing,” the woman said with a sly wink. “But something like forming quintessence?” She shook her head. “That right there is a step beyond me.”
“I imagine,” Lydia said, snapping the locket shut. “If you could, you would be the most famous person in all of Nova… in the entire world.”
Of the nine principal goals of alchemy, only two were considered complete. The transmutation of base metals into noble metals, while still receiving occasional refinements in cost, space, or complexity reduction, was a solved problem, as was the purification of materials and metals. Quintessence was considered the pinnacle of all the goals, though also one problem that only crackpots and charlatans still considered achievable.
At least it was more respectable than life alchemy.
“Which school did you attend for your alchemy studies?” Lydia asked, now curious about the strange woman.
“None. As I said, I dabble. My brother wished for me to learn some fundamental principles for a project and so I did.”
Lydia shook her head, rubbing at her temples in frustration. “That doesn’t… Elemental separation is an advanced technique, not something you could pick up on a whim.”
The woman opened her mouth. Instead of words of explanation, a long, withering sigh rumbled from deep in her chest, filled with that noxious earthen smell of whatever the woman had been smoking. That reminded Lydia with whom she was speaking, she swiftly came to the conclusion that the woman was a liar. Whether she was lying about her abilities with alchemy or her academy didn’t matter. Lydia simply turned aside, waving her hand about in a futile attempt to clear the air.
Once more, the woman gained a sudden cognizance for her own state. “I shall not inflict myself upon you any further,” she said with a heavy nod of her head, sitting fully back in her seat as she closed her eyes.
Lydia didn’t bother acknowledging her, fully expecting the woman to ignore her own statement shortly.
Outside the window, Lydia watched the land rush past. The sun was well on its way down and a thick fog settled in—odd for this time of day. She knew fields lined either side of the rails, but she could scarcely see beyond a shoddy wood and wire fence that lined the tracks. The occasional tree whipped past like a ghostly figure feeling. The next stop had to be close. Then, she could retreat to her private quarters and retreat to one of the books she had in her valise.
Beyond the veil of mist, she thought she saw figures—indistinct, almost amorphous. They moved in a way that wasn’t quite natural. Not people. Not animals. Yet there was a sense of purpose in the movements, a rhythm that was subtly unsettling.
Lydia blinked and the figures were gone, swallowed by the fog. Pressing her hand to the cold glass, she leaned closer to see if she could catch another glimpse, but the world outside was empty once more save for the swirling mist. Her own reflection stared back at her, green eyes wide and searching.
A feeling of being watched lingered.
Lydia turned to the Coggist, only to pause. There was no point in asking the woman about anything. Not only did she have her eyes closed, but high as she was, she was probably seeing a whole lot more than strange figures out in the mists.
Not that there was anything out there. Lydia had been seeing odd things all day. All month, even. Ever since she received the letter inviting her to teach at Eldermoor Academy of Natural Philosophy.
No. Ever since voicing the contents of the letter to others. Professor Alcott, her father, and everyone else she had gone to for advice who were paranoid of Fallowcrest. Paranoia was infectious.
It came as some relief when the slight squealing of the brakes started up a few moments later. The train slowed to a stop, pulling to a far more rural platform than the one in Nova Aurelia. There was hardly a person standing outside the windows.
Most of the train’s passengers got to their feet as the conductor made his appearance once again. “Riverton,” he called out, moving up and down the narrow aisle, pushing past the patrons already on their way out. “Last stop before Fallowcrest.”
He came to a stop in front of Lydia, smiling down at her with that pocket watch louder than ever. “If you’ll wait but a moment, I’ll ensure one of the compartments is tidy.”
“Thank you,” Lydia said, dipping her head. “I appreciate your haste.”
The ticking faded as the conductor continued on his way. That left Lydia alone with the woman, who remained firmly in her seat. The Coggist’s eyes were open again, staring directly at her. Lydia shifted where she sat, discomfort and awkwardness creeping down her spine.
“Not that I didn’t enjoy our conversation,” she said with a forced smile that she hoped looked natural.
The stare hung for one more awkward second before the Coggist dismissed her with a wave of her hand. “Not at all. I’ll depart shortly anyway.”
Lydia raised an eyebrow, pointing out the window as the last call whistle pierced the air. “Shouldn’t you hurry?”
“Oh no, not yet.” She patted the thick black book held to her chest. “First I must deliver some comfort to my bro…ken uh… cog? Who has fallen off the grand tapestry,” she said with a nod of her head toward the compartment holding the prisoner.
“Grand Machine,” Lydia corrected automatically.
That earned her a wide grin and a snap of the woman’s gloved fingers. “That’s the one! I’ll remember that.” She laughed a loud, earthy laugh before consulting a plain silver pocket watch. “I’ll depart at the bend in about… three hours. The train will have to slow to avoid derailing.”
Lydia just stared, not sure what she was supposed to comment on in that mess. The lack of knowledge of her own religion? The fact that she was apparently planning to jump from a moving train?
She quickly decided that she simply did not care. A random meeting in a train like this wasn’t likely to affect either of their lives in any meaningful capacity. She would never see this woman again and the same was true in reverse. In a week’s time, she doubted either of them would remember this conversation—in the Coggist’s case, she probably wouldn’t remember anything an hour from now.
Plastering a kind smile on her face, Lydia simply waited. Another whistle signaled the train’s departure. The jerk of movement knocked her forward again, but she was much better prepared this time around. A few moments after and that loud ticking noise returned.
“My deepest apologies for the wait,” the conductor said.
“Not a problem,” Lydia lied, on her feet before he even finished speaking. With the conductor present, he offered to retrieve her valise from underneath the seat, which Lydia gratefully agreed to as she didn’t want to awkwardly shuffle about in front of the Coggist again.
It turned out to not be a problem. More awake now than when she had been earlier, the Coggist moved aside, stepping out into the aisles. With the valise in the conductor’s hand, he led the way. Lydia trailed behind and the Coggist returned to her seat.
“Good evening,” she said with a nod to Lydia.
Lydia forced a smile, but carried on following the conductor. Of the eight compartments all in a row, one had its door slid open. She paused outside the door to her original compartment, frowning at the spring-drawn blinds blocking the window. It was almost a shame. She couldn’t help but wonder what such a nice-looking man had been arrested for.
But, again, that was another encounter that would vanish into the wind. No sense getting into more trouble with that marshal. She hurried after the conductor as he stepped inside the compartment ahead. With a polite tip of his cap, he left her valise on the center of the floor and stepped right back out.
“Here we are, Miss. Again, I apologize.”
Lydia just shook her head, moving past the conductor to take her seat. “Thank you,” she said. “How long before we arrive?”
“Three hours, twenty minutes,” the conductor said after a brief consultation with his pocket watch. “No more stops. If there was nothing else…?” At the shake of Lydia’s head, he gently closed the compartment door and headed back toward the rear of the train.
Lydia held her breath for a minute, waiting for something to disturb her newfound peace. “Quiet enough at last,” she muttered to herself, pulling her luggage over to the seat next to her. There were only four seats, two on either wall facing each other. If all were occupied, it would have been fairly cramped—hardly different than the public seating save for the partitioning wall around it—but with just her, she could finally relax.
Adjusting the gas lamp, brightening the chamber, she pulled a thin notebook from her luggage. Fundamentals of Alchemic Bonds. A bit basic, but she was going to be teaching beginners at Eldermoor. It wouldn’t do to embarrass herself by forgetting elementary steps.
She barely got started with her revisions barely five minutes, before she heard a heavy thump. Lydia snapped her gaze to the window. It sounded as if it had come from outside.
The train continued to cut through the fog, the rhythmic clatter of the wheels a steady background to Lydia’s thoughts. She peered out the window, leaning close, but the mist had thickened, swirling like smoke around the train, obscuring everything beyond a few feet from the glass. The light from the gas lamp didn’t help, overpowering the dimming sunlight to the point where the window was almost a mirror.
In her reflection, she thought she saw a shadow flit behind her. Lydia turned quickly, but nothing was out of place. The compartment was empty, save for her.
Her heart thudded in her chest, a steady drumbeat that echoed the train’s chugging. Lydia shook her head, trying to dispel the unease by rubbing her thumb against her locket. She returned her gaze to her book, but the words blurred together, refusing to make sense. Her mind kept drifting back to the strange figures she thought she had seen in the fog, the man on the platform, and every other oddity.
The train lurched slightly, giving Lydia another start as a light squeal came from the wheels.
It was nothing. Probably the upcoming bend that the Coggist had mentioned.
Lydia closed her book with a snap. She was clearly too tired to read. All the stress of traveling was getting to her. Four hours was plenty of time for a nap. She reached up, pulling at the thin ribbon that kept her hair in a neat bun. Lydia ran her fingers through her black hair, draping it over one of her shoulders, she then undid the top few buttons of her high-collared blouse. Enough to give her some breathing room.
Not wanting to be caught in a state of impropriety, Lydia stood and approached the compartment door. A small switch engaged the springcoils, lowering the canvas blinds over the window. As the ratcheting mechanism began clicking, she returned to her seat, rested her head on the side of the compartment, and slowly closed her eyes.
Lydia jolted awake at the sound of hurried knocking. It felt like mere moments after she closed her eyes, but she was slumped over with her hair disheveled and her boots kicked off. Bleary eyed and slightly disoriented with that grogginess that came from interrupted rest, she hurried over to the door and slid it open.
No one stood outside. At least, not outside her compartment. Just down the aisle, Lydia caught the Coggist’s eye as the latter stood with her book in hand, waiting in front of the prisoner and marshal’s compartment. The Coggist gave her a little wink just as the door slid open.
“I am here to… mend the broken cog and return it to its rightful place on the Grand Machine,” she said, carefully enunciating the final two words.
“This man’s about as religious as a hog.” Lydia couldn’t see the marshal, but she could hear his gruff voice.
The Coggist hesitated as a worried look crossed her face. She sought out Lydia, as if seeking a boost of reassurance, before drawing in a breath. “Even a hog has its place, I think? Perhaps he will find something of comfort in this book,” she added, patting the thick tome.
“You’re welcome to try, I suppose,” the marshal said. Flashing a grin, the Coggist started forward, only to stop as the marshal reached outside his compartment. “Hold up,” he said, grasping at her clothes. His hands patted her up and down, ostensibly feeling for any hidden weapons the Coggist might have concealed, except he spent far too long feeling up the woman’s chest.
Lydia’s low opinion of the marshal took a dive at that abuse of power. She already didn’t like him solely for the fact that he had stolen her compartment and had been mildly rude in shutting the door in her face. But, while she wasn’t all that enthused with the Coggist either, that was out of line.
Despite that, the Coggist let him touch all he wanted. Probably too high to resist. Lydia almost called out the aisle for him to stop until she noticed the expression on the Coggist’s face. Gone was the airy, drug-addled glassy eyes. In their place, she had a sharp, mocking expression.
A sudden jerk of the train knocked Lydia into the side of the open compartment and almost made the Coggist lose her balance. That signaled the end of the marshal’s groping as he waved her into the room.
The Coggist smiled, but it wasn’t a friendly smile expected of a preacher. The corners of her lips were too sharp. She stepped in with no hesitation despite what just happened.
Lydia took a seat again, leaving her compartment door open. If she heard anything amiss, she could fetch the conductor. Her word versus a marshal wasn’t worth much, but their presence would put a stop to any unfortunate activities.
The train slowed. She could feel the deceleration in her stomach along with a faint squeaking from the brakes. Trying to ignore it, Lydia focused on her hearing. There were some words from the nearby compartment. A bit of shouting back and forth between the Coggist and a different voice. Preaching and the prisoner, presumably. It all went silent a moment after, right when she felt the lateral pull of the train rounding a sharp bend.
That silence broke with the heavy thump of a fist striking meat twice over. A man let out a low groan.
Lydia sat up straighter, her heart hammering as her imagination raced over the possibilities of the noise. She didn’t get far in her imaginations before hearing the compartment door fly open with a clatter.
The Coggist sprinted past her compartment with a manic grin on her face. A step behind, the prisoner dashed past. His eyes brown eyes locked with her as he ran. Tapping two fingers to the brim of his homburg with a wink, he pointed back in the direction he had come from and then continued running.
Lydia stared, wide eyed into the open aisle, wondering if she had just seen what she thought she had seen. Jolting to her feet, she stepped outside her compartment.
The aisle was empty. Neither the Coggist nor the prisoner where anywhere to be seen. Both had been headed toward the engine. In the other direction, back toward the public seating, the few remaining passengers sat, hardly looking bothered by the sudden flight of the other two. The door to her original compartment was open.
Lydia had to brace herself in the doorway as the train continued around its bend. As it did so, a light scraping noise pulled her attention to the floor.
The Book of Cogitation, the same one the Coggist had clutched to her chest the whole time Lydia had been speaking with her, skidded down the aisle with the movement of the train. The pull of the turn stopped and the train started accelerating again. She bent and picked up the book just as it knocked against her boot.
Cracking it open, Lydia stared down in disbelief. Rather than the paper and the words and all the typical things one might find in a book, there was instead a hole. A lack of something. A little cutout in the pages bored through from cover to cover, just the right size for a stubby sort of revolving pistol.
Eyebrows creeping up her forehead, Lydia hurried back into her compartment and pulled her valise up onto one of the seats. She dug into it, tossing clothes and books aside, until she found what she was looking for. A travel-sized Hermetic Engine and vials of elemental essence along with a handful of products Lydia had made in preparation for her trip. Small things, a hangover cure, a stamina potion, a warming tonic, a stain remover, and so on. The smallest vial almost glowed a bright red. Sano. Liquid health. Although not particularly expensive in terms of base materials, the complexity of the product made it rare and quite valuable. Easily worth more than the entire rest of her luggage combined—minus the Hermetic Engine.
If someone had been shot and they weren’t dead yet, it could be just the thing to save them. Although the marshal filled her with a bad taste in her mouth, she didn’t think he deserved to die.
Lydia rushed out of her compartment, leaving it a mess. She hadn’t actually heard a gunshot. Just a thump. A heavy punch, probably. Even still, focused as she had been, she could have zoned out and missed a gunshot amid the clatter of the train’s wheels.
Lydia skidded to a stop in front of her original compartment, utterly flabbergasted at the lack of reaction from anyone else—the man with the pig was still there, idly stroking it as he stared out the window, as was that man with the leer that Lydia didn’t like, staring at her. She shuddered before taking in the state of the compartment.
There wasn’t much room to have caused trouble. Were it not for a broken panel on the wall and the marshal slumped back in a seat with one hand cuffed to the overhead luggage rack, she might have thought nothing was amiss. There was certainly no blood splatter on the walls or pools under her feet. A thick reddish-purple mass was spreading across the marshal’s face, the beginnings of a truly grotesque black eye.
Lydia stepped closer, reaching out toward his neck to take his pulse.
His hand grasped her wrist, yanking her closer as she yelped in surprise. The marshal’s eyes rolled about, taking their time focusing on her. Lydia was no chirurgical or medicinal alchemist, but she knew a concussion when she saw one. He tried to fight through it, managing to focus on her face after a moment. His eyes then flicked to the vial in her other hand.
That prompted him to squeeze down on her wrist harder, twisting her arm painfully.
“What are yo—”
“I’m trying to help!” she said, twisting her body in motion with her arm to keep it from breaking. “It’s sano! A healing vial, nothing more.”
The marshal stared, eyes narrowing. With a shake of his head, he shoved her away, releasing her arm. Lydia fell back into the seat opposite him as he reached up to the handcuff holding him to the luggage rack. Both hands gripping the chain, he grasped it and pulled downward. A loud thunk of snapping metal broke the relatively flimsy fastening holding the bar to the wall. The bar falling almost struck him on the head again, but he barely seemed to notice. After sliding his cuff off the bar, leaving it around his wrist, he started patting himself down.
“Took my gun, my keys, my badge…” He trailed off, a dizzy look momentarily crossing his face. When he recovered, he locked his eyes on the vial Lydia held. “Hand it over,” he said.
Lydia started to protest—it wouldn’t do much for a concussion that a little rest wouldn’t fix and a bruise was hardly worth expending it—but an aggressive step forward had her throwing it at the man. She already regretted trying to help at all. No sense adding a broken wrist to her miseries.
He popped off the cap with a casual flick of his thumb. After one sniff, he downed twenty-eight hours on the Hermetic Engine in about two seconds. He tossed the vial aside, shattering it against the wall of the compartment. Stepping over the shards, he looked up and down the aisle.
“Where’d they go?”
Lydia, staring at the shards of a perfectly reusable vial that she was now going to have to replace, slowly looked at the marshal. “I didn’t see anything,” she lied, feeling spiteful. “Heard a noise, came out to find you like this, ran back to my compartment to find the sano to see if I could help.”
She should have been more like the rest of the passengers.
“I think I saw movement down at the far end of the train,” she added, pointing in the opposite direction she had seen the two run. “Maybe they ran to the next car? Not a lot of places to run on a train.”
There. She could have told him about the Coggist’s plan to jump during that bend in the tracks. He would probably come to that conclusion after a bit of searching anyway. Then again, depending on how long it took for that sano to take effect, his concussion might have him searching the train for the remainder of the journey.
Lydia smiled at his back as he stomped off toward the rear of the train, following her suggestion. Her smile slowly faded as realization set in. She hadn’t the slightest idea who that prisoner was or that fake Coggist. They could be arsonists, murders, or jaywalkers. And she had just helped them escape.
Did that make her an accessory? An accomplice?
Lydia shuddered, pushing herself to her feet while rubbing her wrist. If it came to light that she lied, her career prospects would spiral down the gutter. Never once had Lydia committed a crime. Well… except bootlegging alcohol—but every alchemist did that. Half her job as deputy head of the NAU’s alchemy department had been weeding out new students, giving those only interested in alchemy for alcohol and other controlled substances the boot to make way for more dedicated students.
Pressing her fingers to her temples, she started back toward her new compartment.
There had also been that time when one of her research enterprises ended up maybe kind of almost destroying a lab and she might have blamed it on improperly stored materials, throwing the storehouse manager under the train in the process. Then the minor case of counterfeiting she had accidentally engaged in while testing whether or not her skills with the Hermetic Engine could pass for actual currency, ending up with her walking away with well over a three hundred crests worth of clothing that had only cost about three crests worth of materials plus several hours on the engine.
But those were all minor. Enough for a fine, maybe, but hardly anything that compared to aiding and abetting fugitives.
There was no proof. She hadn’t said anything incriminating. The only ones who knew she knew that she had lied to the marshal were the ones she was now, somewhat accidentally, aiding. They were hardly going to show up and tell the marshal. Especially if that Coggist had been truthful in her plot to jump from the train.
With a reassured nod to herself, Lydia stepped back into her compartment, closed the door behind her, and decided that she had quite enough excitement for the day, thank you very much. She was going to sit, resume her rest, and not worry about criminals or social situations or specters out the window for the remainder of the journey.