Chapter 112 The Railway Pursuit
The morning light had barely risen when the news reached them. A trembling informant brought word to the printing press, his coat soaked from the rain and his hands shaking as he spoke. Victoria had boarded a private train at the Southside Freight Station. She was heading for Dover with a convoy of loyalists and several crates large enough to hold the documents she needed to vanish across the Channel.
Cassandra felt the air leave her chest. She had expected this moment. Emory’s warning had been clear enough. Still, the reality struck hard. If Victoria reached Dover, everything they had uncovered might be lost behind foreign borders. She would carry the forged inheritance records with her, along with the list of heirs she had manufactured to reshape alliances. Once she reached France, she would disappear into political circles that protected people like her.
They could not allow it.
Damian was already moving, pulling on his coat. “We go now. We have only minutes if we want to catch her before the train leaves the city.”
The group spilled into the street. Carriages had been arranged in haste, their horses restless from the sharp morning air. Rowan climbed onto the first cart with Theo, who held the child they had rescued days earlier. Lira, Elias, and Harlan followed in the second. Cassandra and Damian took the front carriage, urging the driver to push the horses harder.
The streets of London blurred around them. Shops were opening their shutters, and factory whistles cut the morning quiet. Workers crossed the roads with lunch tins, staring in confusion as the carriages sped past. The city, still shrouded in early mist, felt brittle and on edge.
Southside Freight Station appeared through the haze like a fortress of iron and steam. Smoke billowed from the engine house, and the heavy clatter of machinery echoed through the yard. Beyond the stacks of coal and rows of cargo crates, Cassandra saw the private train already pulling forward.
Its cars gleamed in polished black metal. The engine spat smoke like a roaring beast. Guards clustered along the sides, rifles slung across their backs.
“Faster,” Cassandra urged the driver. She leaned out of the carriage, gripping the rail as the wheels bounced over uneven stones.
They arrived just as the train began to pick up speed.
“We cannot reach it from here,” the driver warned. “You will have to run.”
Damian was already out of the carriage. He grabbed Cassandra’s hand and pulled her after him. Together they sprinted across the yard, weaving through stacks of crates, metal rods, and half-opened storage doors. The others followed, their footsteps pounding against the wet ground.
Rowan pointed toward a ladder leading to an overhead walkway. “We can jump down onto the last car from there!”
The walkway ran above a series of parallel tracks. If they timed it right, they could leap onto the rear platform as the train rolled beneath them.
Cassandra did not allow herself to think of the risk. She climbed the ladder, her breath tight from the run. The steel walkway trembled under the weight of six people scrambling across it. The train reached the far end of the yard, its speed increasing with every passing second.
Damian watched the final car approach. “On my mark.”
The sound of the engine roared beneath them. Steam rose in thick clouds, swallowing the lower part of the platform. Cassandra tightened her grip on the rail.
“Now!”
They jumped.
The impact jarred her knees, but she landed on the metal grate of the trailing platform. Damian caught her arm before she lost her footing. Elias, Rowan, and Lira landed beside them, though Harlan slipped and barely managed to grab the railing before tumbling off the back. Elias pulled him up with a sharp grunt.
The moment they gained their balance, gunfire erupted.
Victoria’s guards rushed from the next car, rifles raised. Bullets sparked against the metal walls. Cassandra ducked instinctively, pressing her back to the rail. Damian stepped in front of her, shielding her as he drew his pistol and returned fire.
The train rattled over the tracks as it left the city, plunging into the open countryside. Fields unfurled in long, green stretches. The air grew colder, sharper. Smoke trailed behind them, mixing with the morning mist.
Rowan kicked open the door to the next car. “Move!”
They rushed inside. The interior was dim, lit only by small lamps bolted to the walls. Crates were stacked to the ceiling, each marked with a symbol Cassandra recognized from Ruben’s map. These were the transport cases Victoria used for records and ledgers.
“Check them!” Lira called.
Before they could reach the first crate, guards burst through from the opposite door. A fight erupted among the stacks of cargo. The narrow aisle forced everyone close. Harlan tackled one man to the floor. Rowan disarmed another with a blow to the jaw. Damian fought with quick, precise strikes, knocking a rifle from a guard’s hands before slamming him into the wall.
Cassandra ducked behind a crate. Her hands trembled at the sight of so many documents. If even one crate reached the coast, everything they had exposed could be rewritten or buried forever.
A sharp whistle cut through the fight.
More guards surged onto the roof, shouting to each other above the roar of the wind.
“They will cut us off from the front!” Elias warned.
Damian pulled open the window and climbed through, reaching for the metal ladder on the side of the train. Cassandra followed, grabbing his hand as she lifted herself onto the roof.
The wind hit her with brutal force.
The countryside blurred on either side, long ribbons of green and brown whipping past beneath the rising sun. Smoke from the engine drifted across the roof, stinging her eyes and coating her throat with soot. Damian helped her to her feet, steadying her against the gusts.
Up ahead, guards positioned themselves across the roof, rifles aimed directly at the group.
They fired.
Cassandra dropped instantly. The bullet tore a spark from the metal near her head. Damian pulled her behind a raised ridge that ran along the top of the car. Rowan and Elias crawled onto the roof behind her, with Lira and Harlan following close behind.
Rowan touched her shoulder. “We go on three.”
She nodded.
The moment Rowan leapt forward, they followed. The fight on the roof was louder and fiercer than inside. The wind ripped every sound apart. Cassandra ducked beneath a swinging rifle and kicked a guard backward. He lost his footing and tumbled off the side, screaming until the sound was swallowed by the roar of the train.
Damian grappled with a man near the edge, narrowly avoiding being thrown off himself. Cassandra rushed to help, slamming the guard with her shoulder. The man fell.
The train suddenly jerked. Several of them stumbled, catching the ridges beneath their boots.
“They are speeding up!” Lira shouted.
Cassandra scanned the roof. The front cars were heavily reinforced. The car just ahead of them looked different. Its sides were polished. Its roof lined with brass rails. It was Victoria’s private carriage.
But Victoria herself was not visible.
She must have been inside, preparing her escape.
“We reach that car,” Cassandra said. “If we can break the lock, we can stop her.”
They moved forward. Another volley of shots sounded behind them. The guards had regained the rear cars and were advancing again. Damian fired back, buying seconds rather than minutes.
Rowan led the way, balancing across the ridge of the moving train. He reached Victoria's carriage and tried the door. Locked. Reinforced. Above it, a roof hatch sealed with metal bolts.
“We can break it,” he said, panting. “But it will take time.”
Time they did not have.
Another guard lunged at Lira. She twisted aside, striking him with the butt of a pistol she had taken from someone earlier. He fell, rolling across the roof until he slipped off into the fields stretching below.
The train passed beneath a stone bridge. The sudden shadow covered them in darkness. The walls of the bridge scraped dangerously close to the roof. Cassandra pressed herself flat to avoid being crushed. Elias grabbed Rowan and pulled him down just as the stones thundered overhead.
When they emerged back into the sunlight, the moment of calm vanished.
A whistle sounded up ahead. Damian looked toward the front and swore under his breath.
“Another guard car is coming from the engine,” he said. “More of them.”
Rowan struck the bolts on the hatch. One came loose, then another. The third refused to budge.
Cassandra watched the line of guards approaching along the roof. She saw Victoria's private compartment only inches below her. She saw the countryside racing beside them. She felt the entire train trembling as if it were straining to break free from the rails.
And she understood.
“Rowan,” she said quietly. “We cannot open it.”
He looked up, frustration etching sharp lines across his face. “Then we break the hinges.”
“No. It is too heavy and too reinforced. We will not reach her in time. She planned this.”
Damian looked between them. “Then what do we do?”
“We take what we can.”
She pointed to a smaller cargo crate tied to the rear of Victoria's carriage. It was sealed with chains and marked with the same crest as the falsified inheritance ledgers.
“That crate is not guarded heavily,” Cassandra said. “It must hold documents she wanted close but not inside her own compartment. If we can get that, we take something she cannot replace.”
Damian nodded once. “Agreed.”
Rowan broke the chains with Lira's help. The lid swung open. Inside, stacks of letters, journals, and miniature registers lay bundled tightly. Some were wrapped in oilcloth. Some bore official seals that Cassandra recognized immediately.
They had captured one of her blackmail collections.
Shouts rose behind them. More guards were closing in. Cassandra scrambled to gather as much as she could. Damian and Elias pulled bundles into their coats. Rowan secured several in a canvas sack. Harlan kicked a guard attempting to climb up the ladder.
The train veered sharply.
They lost their footing. Cassandra nearly slid off the edge, but Damian grabbed her wrist and hauled her back. The train thundered across a stone viaduct, water rushing beneath them.
Ahead, another bridge approached. Lower than the last.
Too low for anyone to remain standing.
“Jump!” Damian shouted.
There was no more time for thought.
They leapt together, landing in the tall grass just as the train roared beneath the bridge. The impact sent pain through Cassandra’s arms and legs, but she pushed herself up, forcing air back into her lungs.
The train continued into the distance, gaining speed as it headed toward Dover. Victoria’s carriage glinted in the sun before disappearing behind a curve in the tracks.
They had not caught her.
But they had taken something she needed.
The crate sat beside them in the grass, its secrets spilling through the fractured lid.
Cassandra steadied her breath. “She is losing control.”
Damian placed a hand on her back, steadying her. “And she knows it.”
Elias knelt beside the documents, his face pale from exhaustion and the emotional weight of the morning, but there was determination in his eyes.
“We follow her to Dover,” he said. “And then we end this.”
Cassandra looked down the tracks. Smoke coiled upward like a dark serpent against the sky.
Victoria was running.
But now they knew her direction.
And for the first time, Cassandra felt the tide begin to turn.