of the cages, and drop into the dark. The hot smell of hay and horse manure wafted Kate’s way and a very disheveled-looking Edgar crept over to her with hay sticking out of his wild hair and soot from the cellar fire still clinging to his clothes.
“That should keep them busy,” he said, grinning as another rocket whizzed overhead.
“Edgar! What are you doing here?”
“Helping you. What does it look like?”
“How did you—?”
“We don’t have long. Silas’ll find the fuses in a minute. They’ve got crates full of those things out there.” Edgar pulled a long black key out of his boot and unlocked Kate’s cage. “I got this off a wall hook three carriages back. I was starting to think you weren’t on board. Most of the other prisoners are off now.” The door swung open and he held out his hand. “Let’s go, then.”
“Artemis is here,” said Kate, as soon as she was free. “I saw him.”
“I know. I saw him too, but there isn’t time to . . . Hang on. Trouble.”
Kate followed Edgar’s eyes. Silas was crossing the platform, heading right for their carriage.
“Quick! Climb up!” said Edgar, holding her cage as still as he could.
Kate jumped on to the bars and climbed them right up to the roof beams. She looked down once she had reached the top, but Edgar was gone.
Silas’s shadow spread across the carriage, and Kate leaned back, trying to stay quiet. It took only a moment for Silas to realize she was gone, and the cages crashed together as he began searching for her.
She had to move. She had to get away from him.
The place Kate was sitting was only two carriages away from the Night Train’s engine. She skirted the roof quickly and found the top rung of a ladder taking her right down to the tracks.
“You!” Kate heard Silas’s shout in between two more screeching bangs.
He had found Edgar.
There was nothing she could do. If she went back, she would be caught—and what good would she be to anyone then? She forced herself to walk away from the shout, down a narrow worker’s path squashed between the train and the station wall. Soon she was right beside the hot black engine and there were only two choices from that position: down into the tunnel, or back onto the platform. There was no way to know where that tunnel came out. Edgar was in trouble, and every second she wasted carried Artemis farther away. She had to risk the platform.
With fireworks still lighting up the air, no one noticed Kate climbing from the tracks and squeezing through a broken panel in the side of the wooden fence. Water dripped from the muddy ceiling like indoor rain and tickled her head as she slipped unnoticed into the crowd, most of whom had their arms over their heads for protection, pushing their way toward the arched exit behind them. She was just about to follow them, hoping to find Artemis somewhere on the other side, when Silas dragged one final prisoner onto the platform.
Edgar limped awkwardly into the light, squinting through a bruised eye. As soon as some of the braver bidders saw him they started counting what was left in their coin pouches, weighing up Edgar’s value with eager eyes, but one look at Silas’s face showed that he was not for sale. His eyes scoured the crowd. Kate ducked behind a tall woman beside her, and when she looked out again Silas was marching Edgar off to the prisoners’ exit on foot. That must have meant something serious, because the crowd suddenly became angry, squeezing forward to glare and shout.
“Traitor!” spat the woman closest to Kate. “You’ve earned what you’ll get, boy.”
“Traitor.”
“Traitor!”
Edgar turned to look at the heckling crowd. He was trying to put on a brave face, but Kate could see right through it. She knew he was scared and she pushed her way forward, determined to do something, anything to let him know she was still there and that he was not alone. She dodged around the heaving bodies and found herself squashed against the wooden fence as Edgar walked by. There was only one safe way to get his attention, so she shouted out loudly with everyone else.
“Traitor!”
Edgar looked up, recognizing her voice, and she raised her eyebrows in a small way that no one else could see, trying to send everything she wanted to say to him in one desperate smile. His face brightened a little when