The heavy boots stomped onto the floorboards directly above their heads, the sound vibrating through the rotting timber ceiling and showering fine, gray dust down onto Vaelric’s face.Vaelric’s eyes snapped open, the golden luminescence pulsing fiercely beneath his skin as he scrambled backward against the damp stone foundation wall. "They found us," he hissed, his voice a raw rasp as he tried to yank his copper-wrapped arm out of the dirt-driven grounding rod. "Seraph, wake up—they’re right above the cellar door."Seraphyne didn’t hesitate. She rolled off the makeshift pallet, her bruised ribs flaring with a white-hot agony that made her gasp, but she bit down hard on her lower lip until she tasted copper. "Stay down," she whispered fiercely, her hand darting out to grab her crossbow from where it leaned against a wooden crate. "Don't let them see the glow. If they look through the cracks, cover your arm with your jacket."Above them, the muffled sound of heavy furniture being shoved

"I'm telling you, mister enforcer, you're looking in all the wrong places if you think those out-of-town runaways are still drinking at the bar," Jolee’s slurred, greasy voice cut right through the floorboards above the cellar, dripping with cheap whiskey and unmistakable greed.Vaelric stiffened, his fingers curling into a tight fist as the metal plating on his right arm clicked with a sharp, lethal warning. "Did you hear that?" he hissed, his voice dropping an octave as the golden veins beneath his skin flared bright enough to cast long, dancing shadows against the damp stone walls. "That bastard sold us out."Seraphyne didn’t look back from where she was frantically sliding a brass-capped explosive charge into her canvas satchel, her eyes hard and cold as flint. "I told you we shouldn't have traded him the scope for that copper wire," she snapped, her breath catching slightly as a sharp twinge from her bruised ribs made her wince. "Greedy rats always squeak the loudest when the cat

A blinding magnesium-white glare detonated at the top of the cellar stairs, instantly swallowing the harsh midday sunlight in a roaring wall of artificial lightning and blinding white heat."Argh! My eyes! I can't see a damn thing!" a corporate enforcer shrieked from the threshold, his voice cracking into a panicked pitch as his boots scrambled frantically against the splintered wood of the staircase."Fall back! They've got flash charges!" another voice bellowed overhead, accompanied by the chaotic clatter of dropped carbines and bodies crashing against the wooden doorframes of the taproom."Now, Vaelric! Move!" Seraphyne yelled over the ringing in her ears, her boots kicking up a storm of dirt and rotting root vegetables as she hauled herself toward the rear foundation wall of the cellar.Vaelric didn't waste a single breath on words; the adrenaline flooding his veins made his heart hammer against his ribs like a trapped piston, driving the golden current beneath his skin into a vio

The iron wheels shrieked against a tight rail curve, sending a shower of orange sparks flying into the cool, rushing air of the late afternoon."Check your arm, Vaelric. Is the vibration making the wiring slip?" Seraphyne demanded, rolling onto her side in the deep, sloping belly of the ore hopper. Her fingers immediately flew to the makeshift copper harness binding his right forearm, checking the tension of the twisted metal coils."It's holding, mostly," Vaelric panted, pressing his back against the vibrating corrugated steel wall of the freight car. He winced as a fresh wave of heat pulsed from beneath his skin, making the copper wire bite deeper into his flesh. "The current’s pulsing with every rotation of the axle, though. Every time the wheels hit a joint in the track, it feels like someone's driving a hot needle straight into my elbow.""Keep your teeth gritted," Seraphyne snapped back, her eyes darting constantly toward the open top of the car to scan the graying sky for corpo

"Look back down the line, Seraphyne—tell me that's just a maintenance rig or a shadow playing tricks against the ballast," Vaelric snarled, his voice rising sharply over the deafening, metallic shriek of the freight car's iron wheels biting into a sweeping curve.Seraphyne scrambled on her hands and knees across the coal-dusted steel floor of the ore hopper, ignoring the sharp, tearing pain that flared instantly across her heavily taped ribs. She thrust her upper body half out over the rusted rim of the car, squinting through the thick, greasy plumes of black smoke billowing back from the freight’s straining locomotive. A quarter-mile behind them, riding hard upon a parallel spur line that converged toward their own tracks, a low-slung, heavily armored steam engine came barreling into view. Its massive brass boiler gleamed with a predatory, polished menace under the pale twilight sky, and mounted directly to its forward cowcatcher was a rotating twin-barrel searchlight sweeping the ra