Last Car to Annwn Station (10 page)

“Bye,” Jill said, her eyes alight with mirth. She turned to Donald. “Sorry about that. What can I help you with?”

Mae used Donald’s momentary confusion to make her exit. Slipping out of the library, she made herself walk and not run back to the elevators. She retrieved her pepper spray from the guards in the lobby and stepped back out into the freezing late-October afternoon.

She climbed aboard the train and took a seat, shivering from her short exposure to the outside temperatures. She looked around, surprised that she was the only person in the car. The snow was falling in heavy sheets, and the train was moving slowly along the track. A burst of cold air swept through the train, making the hair on the back of Mae’s neck stand up. Three figures wearing hooded sweatshirts had entered the train. One of them sat down immediately while the other two walked toward her. Mae shifted, placing her back to the wall of the train car. She fumbled in her bag, grabbing the can of spray. She kept the can in her bag where they could not see it, but she could draw it out in an instant. The figures walked past. One sat on the bench nearest the exit. The other turned and looked at her, red eyes standing out against the white, dog-like face.

Mae realized they had neatly cut her off from the exits.

A fourth figure entered the car and settled across from her. Screwing up her courage, Mae looked up at the person. The cold, gray eyes of William Hodgins regarded her.

“Hello, Mae.”

Mae looked forward, unwilling to meet the man’s gaze, afraid he would trap her again. She swallowed back the fear-induced bile rising in her throat and took a shaky breath.

“Nothing to say, Miss Malveaux?” Hodgins’s voice came harsh and raspy.

“Are you here to kill me?” Mae asked in a soft voice.

“Yes. I’m sorry, Mae. You’ve left me with little choice. You’re too inquisitive. You know too much. I cannot allow you to oppose us.”

“How do you plan to do it?” Mae reasoned that the longer she kept her opponent talking and distracted, the higher her chances of something happening in her favor.

“I promise it will be quick and relatively painless.”

“Well that’s a mercy.” Mae looked past the two hounds in front of her, watching with their glowing red eyes. She knew she was going to die, but she would not make it easy for any of them. She found the trigger of her pepper spray and withdrew the small can from her bag, keeping it from sight.

“It’s time.” He stood, drawing the round crystal from his pocket. One of the hounds stepped forward. “Goodbye, Mae.”

Mae exploded out of her seat, letting all the aggression she had learned playing hockey with the neighborhood boys come to the fore. She hit Hodgins hard with her shoulder, lifting the man from his feet and slamming him into the opposite wall. There was a sharp cracking noise and a raspy exhale.

Mae turned to the hounds in front of her. They were between her and the nearest exit. The one standing rushed her as the others left their seats. Mae pulled the pin from the can and aimed at the hound closest to her, squeezing out a stream of chemicals. She rushed forward, holding her breath and squinting her eyes.

The first of the two-legged C
n Annwn fell to the floor of the train car, writhing in pain and trying to cover its face. The second creature was on her as she changed the direction of her spray. It caught her arm with its claw-like fingernails, ripping into her heavy coat. Mae twisted and struck with her knee, as she had been taught in her self-defense class. The thing gave a short bark and stepped backward. She jabbed the can of spray into its face and held the trigger down. It backed away, howling, covering its eyes. She pushed past it as her spray ran out.

The train stopped and the exit door opened. Mae could see safety, a snowy platform full of pedestrians, only a handful of feet away. Another of the hounds came in behind her. It caught her around the waist and bore her backward. She stumbled, slamming into the side of one of the benches. The hound’s face contorted into a dog’s head.

The train door hissed shut and the machine started moving again.

Mae lashed out with her arms and legs, trying to force the creature off. She raised her arm to cover her face and it bit down. Teeth sank into her coat, driven by powerful jaws. They punctured the fabric and tore into Mae’s arm.

Mae screamed. She brought her other hand up and raked the creature across the eyes with her nails. It released her arm. Mae tried to twist away, seeking the door, wanting to get out of the car. She braced a foot against the side of a bench and pushed hard, driving the creature back. There was a snapping noise as they hit the edge of the opposite bench, and the creature yelped once before it went limp and slumped to the floor.

She straightened as another of the dog-men lunged at her. Mae swept her bag off her shoulder and swung down with it, catching the hound across the side of the head. The creature fell, stunned. Mae caught a glimpse of William Hodgins, sitting on the floor, holding his left arm close to his body.

The train stopped. Mae lost her footing and crashed to the floor. She crawled and dived toward the door as it swung open. Leaping forward, Mae fell into the packed snow and ice on the platform at the feet of a group of waiting commuters.

Mae rose to her hands and knees, looking up. The two surviving hounds exited the train and turned toward her.

She scrambled up as the shocked group of waiting riders backed away. Sprinting up the street toward the warehouse district, she ran hard and screamed for help, hoping to draw attention. She heard a shrill scream behind her and realized that someone must have climbed onto the train and found the dead body.

Mae saw two more shapes come from between buildings in front of her. She turned right and dived into the crosswalk against the light. She heard horns and what might have been a car riding up onto the curb and striking a pole, but she kept her focus on getting away. She chanced a glance over her shoulder. There were five hounds now, and they were closing in on her. Mae tried to put on a burst of speed, desperate to reach the police station only two blocks away, but her feet lost their grip on the icy sidewalk. She tumbled and rolled forward. The hounds surrounded her.

Mae rose to her knees. Her coat sleeve was soaked through with blood and she was starting to lose feeling in her arm. She looked around for help, but the street was strangely devoid of traffic. She could hear sirens in the distance.

Mae knelt in the dirty snow and glared at what she suspected was the lead hound. Her breath came hard and raspy after her run.

“Do it!” she cried. “Get it over with!”

The presumed pack leader lunged at her, his mouth morphing into a long, tooth-filled muzzle. Mae closed her eyes.

A surprised yelp of pain made Mae open her eyes again.

Kravis ap Thimp, the ugly man-like thing who had greeted Mae on her first streetcar ride, stood in front of her. His right arm was wrapped in heavy bandages and his left wielded a wicked-looking curved blade. Kravis made quick work of the first hound, leaving it dying on the sidewalk, bleeding black on the snow. Mae rose to her feet as the bell of a streetcar rang out urgently.

“Get on the car, Mae!” Kravis yelled, using his weapon to hold the other three hounds at bay. Mae realized he had lost the element of surprise and the hounds had regrouped.

Mae started for the car when two of the hounds attacked Kravis from opposite sides. He stabbed one in the chest, but the other was on his back, tearing into his neck. The last hound rushed forward.

Unthinking, Mae charged, placing her slight frame between the hound and Kravis. The larger, heavier creature crashed into her. She lost her footing again and fell on her back with a hard thud.

“Police, everyone stay where you are!” a voice above Mae commanded.

Mae fought back the pain, resisting the urge to either pass out or throw up. She managed to get two shallow breaths, followed by a slightly larger one. She tried to sit up, but her back felt on fire. Mae twisted around to see a woman holding an automatic pistol in one hand, a badge in the other. The woman held her weapon like she meant business. Mae recognized Sergeant Dean, even in her street clothes.

The hounds turned and rushed the police woman. Mae heard gunfire and a scream as she rolled, scrambling to reach the waiting streetcar. Kravis was lying across the steps of the car, blood oozing from the back of his neck. A second burst of gunfire sounded. Bullets ricocheted off the buildings. Mae screamed in pain as something hot slammed into her middle. She was pulled through the doors of the streetcar. Behind her there was a wet ripping sound and a short, gurgling scream. The door of the streetcar closed.

“Ten cents, please.”

Mae stumbled to her feet and reached into her pants pocket. Fumbling, she withdrew a handful of coins. They were covered in blood. She looked stupidly at the sticky red liquid smeared on her hand before dropping the coins on the floor. Mae blinked to clear her blurry vision, looking down. Blood was spreading across her stomach, running down her pants and to the floor. At her feet lay Kravis, his eyes closed, his breathing labored and unsteady. She looked up for the conductor and found herself facing a disheveled William Hodgins standing in the aisle before her, still holding his injured arm awkwardly against his body.

Hodgins raised the glowing crystal in his good hand. “Goodbye, Mae.”

“You are not welcome here,” the conductor said, stepping up behind Hodgins and placing a hand on his shoulder.

Mae slipped on the bloody floorboard and fell. Her face on the floor, she looked out the door windows. A pack of the C
n Annwn were shadowing them, pacing the streetcar despite the breakneck speed at which it was moving, running in the gray mists outside. Mae knew she should have felt afraid, but all she felt was cold and weak.

She looked up at Hodgins and the conductor. They were struggling. Several creatures, some winged, some with animal heads, some who looked almost human, surrounded the combatants, reaching for Hodgins. As they started to wrestle him down, he dropped the clear crystal marble to the floor and—with a harsh curse—stamped down on it.

There was a brilliant flash of light, and Mae felt the streetcar began to tip. She heard the high whine of the brakes. There was a moment of silence, and then Mae was flung like a rag doll around the inside of the car as it rolled over and flipped. The tortured screech of the wooden car breaking into pieces was overlaid with the terrified screams of the car’s occupants. The car tumbled twice more, breaking in half before coming to rest in the shadows.

Mae landed with a painful crash halfway out a window. Through swollen, unfocused eyes she watched the white hounds close in on her. They gripped her coat with their teeth, dragging her wounded body out of the broken window and away from the wreckage of the streetcar, into the gray mist beyond.

Mae blacked out.

How long she was unconscious, Mae did not know. When she opened her eyes she found herself lying on her back, snow falling on her face. She sat up. The hounds lay in the snow, encircling her. They watched her with blazing silver eyes, their tongues lolling out of their mouths and over their wicked, yellow teeth, panting from their exertion.