“Hold on,” Jack instructed as they took off.

The sudden burst of movement jerked her backward. Mila wrapped her arms around Jack and pressed her cheek against his back. This was not fun!

She could feel him laughing against her face and beneath her hands. Lifting her head, she dared open her eyes. The world whipped past as they sped down the darkened streets. Wind tugged at her hair and stung her eyes. She felt free.

Alive.

Perhaps this velocycle business was fun, after all.

She directed Jack to the spot where she’d come aboveground, and the others followed. Finley took the lead as they descended into the underground, Mila just behind her. Finley was very strong—she knew this because she’d actually pulled Mila when Mila hadn’t wanted to move—but she had to possess more than just strength if she was the one chosen to put herself first in the path of any danger.

“What is that smell?” Finley asked, wrinkling her nose.

“That’s death,” Jack replied, glancing at Griffin, who nodded grimly.

“It’s Her Majesty,” Mila told them, her eyes adjusting to the dark so that she could see the head and mangled body lying in the shadows. “Before I ran out I remember him hitting her with something.”

“A hammer,” Finley supplied. She stood over what was left of Her Majesty, shining a light on the ruined mass of metal and putrid flesh.

“There’s a digger.” Griffin moved quickly to where the hulking machine lay. He nudged with his boot and sniffed. “Smells as though it overheated.”

“You reckon it was Em?” Finley asked, glancing at him.

“Judging from the way it fell I’d say so. It was system failure not violence that took it down.” He squatted beside the machine and touched its front. His fingers came away glistening with bluish-green. “This fluid has organites in it.”

“It’s what is in the Master’s tank,” Mila added.

Griffin pulled a vial from his pocket and scooped up some of the substance. “Lead on, Mila.”

She led them through the dank, winding darkness. Their torches cut swaths of light through the dirt and dust. It didn’t take very long to find the door to the hidden rooms. She pulled it open and stepped over the threshold. The others followed.

“What the hell…” Griffin swung the beam of his torch over the refuse and mess.

Mila couldn’t believe her eyes. “They’re gone.”

Chapter 15

Emily’s head hurt. Again. Her whole body hurt. Was she dead?

A loud clacking noise made her open her eyes a fraction. As her vision cleared she saw the doll-headed spider creature standing above her. If she was dead, she was in hell.

“She says for you to get up, you traitorous dog.” The voice that spoke had a tinny sound to it. She knew without looking that it was another automaton.

“And if I don’t?” she challenged, not that lying on the dirt was the least bit comfortable.

She was seized by the hair and the trousers by metal clamps and jerked to her feet. Her knees bent but held as her weight settled upon them. Her head pounded, and she pressed her hand to it. At least the machine that lifted her had released her hair.

The spider approached. It reared back on its hind legs, extending three—one was hanging bent and broken near the back four—to Emily’s head and shoulders. She went rigid but didn’t move as it pressed the tip of each leg to her flesh, each in a spot that ached.

Pain lanced through her and then disappeared, leaving her with a dull ache in her head rather than a raging migraine. Emily regarded the creature warily. She’d heard of this sort of treatment before but never experienced it. Supposedly the idea was to increase blood flow to and ease tension in the affected muscles. “Thank you.”

It clacked at her, waving its delicate but strong limbs.

“She did not do it to be nice. She did it because we need you to be at your best.”

“I don’t need an interpreter,” she shot back at the annoying smooth-faced automaton. “And I don’t give a bloody hell how you need me.”

Had they caught Mila? What happened after she took down the digger? And where was Sam? He wasn’t in the room with her. What had they done with him? Panic clawed at her throat.

“For the procedure,” the automaton replied as though her burst of temper hadn’t mattered. It was like the one with the smooth face, only this one had a spot for eyes and a mouth built into it. “You will transfer the Master’s brain into its host.”

So Mila hadn’t escaped. Damnation. So she would be a murderess then. No matter how this played out she was going to take a life.

She knew it might come to this. She’d already made up her mind to kill Garibaldi if the opportunity arose. No time for second thoughts now.

“Come,” the metal instructed, and pushed her toward a door. It was then that she realized they were on board a train. When she crossed the narrow threshold she stepped out into a platform before entering yet another car. They weren’t moving, but they were definitely on a track underground. What happened if another train came along?

Then she looked at the scene before her and she didn’t care if another train crashed into them or not.

Garibaldi was still in his tank. Next to it was a sturdy cot—a surgical bed. And strapped to it with bands of steel was Sam. How much laudanum had they given him to keep him so placid?

Mila was nowhere to be seen, which meant they were keeping her elsewhere or…

Clacking. “You will put the Master’s mind into this body,” Metal Face told her. More clacking. “You will do this or die.”

She wanted to scream at him that she understood what the damned spider said, but her throat was too tight.

On the cot Sam moved. The metal holding him groaned. A small, onion-shaped automaton depressed a syringe into Sam’s neck. Within seconds he fell silent and still.

“Then I’ll die,” Emily said. There really wasn’t any choice involved at all.

Clearly this was not what the machines expected. The spider moved around to face her, clacking so fast and sharp that it reminded Emily of her mother when she was in a fine and fierce temper.

“You will do it or he will die.”

Emily’s heart clenched. This was proof that the machines might be able to think but they couldn’t feel. They didn’t understand that this was even less of a threat than the one against her own life. She’d saved Sam before and made him something he didn’t want to be. If she did this, his body would live but there wouldn’t even be a trace of her Sam left in him. He would rather die than become a vessel for a man he despised—a man they all despised.

“So kill him.” She looked at the spider. “I’ll kill him myself if it means Garibaldi loses.”

The doll head—grimy and smeared with its matted hair—turned to Metal Face. This time it chittered rather than clacked. It said something about being confused and the master. The other automaton moved gracefully across the floor. It must have been used as a server in a wealthy home or a club. It stopped at the tank and lifted a length of insulated wires, which it then plugged into the socket on the back of its skull. The metal shuddered and shook for a second and then went rigid.

A few seconds later, it spoke, “I have to say, Miss O’Brien, that you have much more of a backbone than I would have thought.”

Emily’s eyes narrowed. “Garibaldi.” He was speaking through the automaton. “I’m never going to do what you want, so you may as well do your worst.”

“You do not want me to do my worst, little girl. My worst will be crueler than you can imagine.”

Really? She could imagine great cruelty. She’d already suffered more cruelty than most people in her short life.

“It must be maddening,” she remarked, “having your mind so sharp and your body so utterly useless. Having to depend on your disciples to keep you alive while your agile mind plots and schemes.”

“There have been some benefits. Miss Xing was quite easy to manipulate into haunting our friend the young duke, and I find the Aether most accommodating to my needs. How was Griffin last time you saw him? I imagine he’s fairly exhausted by now. That makes him all the more susceptible to me, you know.”

“Giving away your secrets? You must not have any intention of allowing me to survive this. That doesn’t exactly motivate me, boyo.” She was baiting him, but how else could she get him to admit all that he had planned? Standing around listening to his pompous ranting kept Sam alive and gave Griffin, Finley and Jasper more time to find them. And her friends would come.

“Oh, do not fret, child. I know exactly how to motivate you. You will do exactly as I command.”

“Enlighten me.”

Like most prideful and overly confident people he didn’t need much provocation to brag about his intelligence. “You will go forward with the procedure. You will be tethered to my spider, which will be connected with my mind until the last possible moment. It will relate your progress to me. If I think for one tiny moment that you play to betray me I will make certain Griffin, Finley, that American, your brothers—everyone you care about will have a visit from my children, and they won’t stop until every last one of your loved ones is dead. And you will be made to look at each and every body until you beg to be ended, as well.”

Emily’s mouth went dry. So much for her own arrogance. It was one thing to wager with her own life— even Sam’s and the others’, but to put her family at risk… Garibaldi was a top-notch villain to threaten them, and she knew he’d make good on the threat.

She needed to have a plan in place to eliminate him before the procedure began, and she wouldn’t be able to think of it at all while tethered to the spider. It would pick up on any changes to her thought patterns, heart rate, et cetera.

“You will kill that many innocent people just so you can have a body?”

“Come now, you and I both know they’re not that innocent. It’s your fault I’m trapped like this. You played a part in my downfall. It’s only fitting that you orchestrate my triumphant return.”

She’d pretend to retch if Sam wouldn’t suffer for it. Baiting Garibaldi was one thing, but mocking him would put him into a temper and if he was responsible for Griffin’s exhaustion and lack of concentration then he might retaliate by hurting her friend all the more.

“If I do this, you will leave my family alone?”

“You have my word.”

“You won’t harm Griffin, Finley or Jasper, either.”

He hesitated.

“Swear it, Garibaldi. I’ll have your word or you can find someone else to do your bidding, and we both know you’re running short on time.”

“You’re not in a position to provoke me, Miss O’Brien.”

“You can make good on all your threats, Garibaldi, but I’m your only hope for a successful transplant. We both know that, otherwise you would have found someone else. I reckon you hadn’t originally planned to let Griffin know you were still around this soon.”

Silence. Yes, she had him there. He had to know that Griffin was onto him. If they hadn’t realized it before Sam went missing, they would know it as soon as Mila found them, which had hopefully already happened. The clock was ticking, which was no doubt why they were on a train rather than in the catacombs.

“Fine. I give you my word that your friends and family will not be harmed.”

It didn’t matter, but she breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you. As soon as I do an inventory of surgical instruments and make certain Sam is a viable host for your mind we’ll get started.”

“You will start immediately. You have everything you need and Samuel has already been tested.”

She must have been unconscious longer than she thought.

The spider set a pair of hair clippers on the tray next to Sam’s cot. “I don’t need to shave his head,” she told the creature. “I can peel back his scalp to expose his skull.” It was a good thing she didn’t suffer from an abundance of spleen, else she’d be nauseous.

“They’re for you,” Garibaldi informed her through his metallic translator. “My freakish pet needs to plug into your brain.”

“No, it doesn’t.” And did the spider mind being called a “freakish pet”? Did he not realize that his metal children could turn on him at any moment? Or was he like her and could exert his will over them? Could he do it without touching them?

“Ah, you are a Technomancer.”

That was one way to describe it. A poncey way. “Yes.” She didn’t mind admitting it if it kept hair on her head. It was girly of her. Vain, too, but while she’d die for Sam, she would not go bald for him unless she absolutely had to.

This was not one of those times. She intended to destroy Garibaldi, and if she kept her wits about her, both she and Sam would walk out of here alive, hair and brains intact.

“Then there is no need to create a port into your mind. Lovely. That saves us so much time. Wash your hands, Miss O’Brien. You’ve surgery to perform.”

The spider gestured to a nearby sink as the small, onion-shaped automaton wheeled over a spindly stand. They were going to have to feed Sam a steady supply of laudanum to keep him asleep throughout the entire process.

As Emily washed her hands with tepid water, she took a short moment to pray. There were times in her life when she wasn’t certain God even existed. In fact, she still didn’t know, but she threw her pleas for help out into the Aether and hoped that, somehow, they fell upon the right ears.