Slash mounted two steps to his throne and sat. 'Have you met the Royal Butchers?' he asked.
Claire shuddered as the two swordsmen stepped forward, in perfect time, until one was behind her, the other behind Jeffers. Then they performed an about turn, so that they were facing their king again.
'They will carve the meat from you while you still breathe.'
Claire swallowed.
'They will suck the marrow from your bones and—'
'Enough.' Jeffers' voice was quiet but steady.
Silence.
Claire wanted to scream at him, Be quiet! Don't make them angry! They're going to slice me up alive!
Slash rose slowly from his throne. He stepped down to their level. He stood in front of Claire. He moved his impassive lion face right into hers. Slash sniffed at her. Sweat dripped down her back.
'Please . . .' she whispered.
Pure dread.
He moved on to Jeffers. Two sets of eyes bore into him — the unmoving lion eyes and the brown human eyes, narrow, piercing. Jeffers stared straight ahead.
'What do you want?' Jeffers asked.
Slash began to laugh, but it sounded odd, hollow, through the mask. Suddenly, and with considerable speed, he whipped the dagger from its sheath and held it to Jeffers' neck just below the ear. Claire let out an involuntary cry.
'What do I want?' Slash hissed. 'I want Titanic.'
31
Hang On
They came to their second station platform of the afternoon, but they were still resolutely out in the country. They were exhausted. New York seemed as far away as ever. Jimmy knew they weren't going to be able to do anything to help Titanic if they didn't get a move on. The war had probably already started. The President versus King Slash. It sounded like something you'd dream up in a nightmare.
Ronni lay down on the platform and refused to budge. 'Just ten minutes,' she pleaded.
Jimmy stared up the line. He thought they were probably walking along a track that had only been used irregularly even before the plague had struck; it just felt remote, even though he knew the massive sprawl of New York could not be that far away. Possibly it looped right around the outskirts of the city, serving small outlying communities. There must be a connection somewhere up ahead which would have transferred the President's train on to the main line leading directly into the city. But it could still be miles away.
He returned to the platform, wandered past the ticket window and down a set of moss-tinged wooden steps into a small car park. There were three cars there, but they had been stripped of their essential parts and drained of fuel and now they lay with their doors open, windows smashed. It was a pity. A car would at least have gotten them as far as the outskirts of the city. If New York was anything like Miami or any of the larger cities he'd recently visited, that would have been the limit of it's usefulness — everywhere he'd been the streets had been impassable because of abandoned vehicles.
At the end of the car park there was a wooden shack with a sagging roof which had collapsed at one end. He pulled the bolt back on the door and looked inside, then nearly had a heart attack as a bird or a bat or something flashed past him. He took a deep breath and stepped in. It was a mechanic's workshop. Benches were piled high with spare parts and tools; it smelled of oil and paint. At the end where it had caved in there was a crumpled tarpaulin which had protected something from the cascade of rotten wood and rubble. Somewhat apprehensive of setting off a further collapse, Jimmy nevertheless cautiously raised the end of the tarp and peered beneath.
Ronni was out for the count. She'd only meant to rest her legs, but her exhausted body had overridden that intention and the moment she allowed her eyes to even flutter, she was gone. What brought her back was a roar. Her survival instincts had been so finely honed by her horrific experiences over the past few months that even before she was really awake she had rolled off the platform on to the track and was running with all the speed she could muster. But the roar was getting closer and closer. She daren't look back, she just had to escape, she had to—'
'Ronni, do you want a lift?'
Jimmy cruised effortlessly past her astride a gleaming red Kawasaki motorcycle. Ronni stopped, gasping for breath, as Jimmy turned the bike and came back towards her.
'Jimmy! You nearly . . . !'
He ignored her. He was in love. He'd occasionally ridden scrambler bikes over rough terrain with his friends back in Belfast, but this was something altogether different — fast, powerful and with half a tank of petrol. The bike was far from new, he could tell that, but someone long dead had lavished a lot of attention on it. It felt fantastic.
'So, what are you waiting for?' Jimmy laughed. 'Climb on!'
Ronni looked at the bike, and then at Jimmy, doubtfully. 'Crash helmets?' she asked hopefully.
'Yeah, right.'
In fact, she loved it too. She tucked her legs in and held tight to Jimmy, peering over his shoulder as they roared down country roads, the wind in their hair, teenagers having fun. Even as they entered the suburbs of the city he was able to weave in and out of abandoned cars and mount sidewalks, and it barely slowed them down. Ronni wasn't quite so relaxed now — she shouted above the engine that the noise of the bike against the silence of the city was sure to attract attention. But he wouldn't listen. He was enjoying himself too much. Of course he didn't say that. He shouted back that the further they could get at speed the better. There was no time to waste. They would have to take the chance — and besides, it was a huge city and they'd barely entered the outer limits of it. She had no choice but to hold on. They skirted the edge of Newark Airport, the huge fleets of abandoned planes a stark reminder of the scale of the disaster.
A couple of miles further on the engine began to splutter and cough. Jimmy gunned it, trying to coax life back into it, but within a few hundred metres it died completely.
'Out of petrol,' he said as he dismounted.
He looked about him; there were strip malls on both sides of the street.
'OK,' said Ronni. 'It got us this far, now we start walking.'
Jimmy took hold of the handles and began to push it. 'Not yet,' he said. 'There'll be a petrol station further up.'
He was already straining to support the weight of the bike.
'Jimmy — now it'll slow us down. You have to leave it.'
'No.'
He pushed on. Ronni walked out in front, occasionally casting disapproving glances back at him. She was scared now. She had felt a certain measure of security with Jimmy, but now that he was acting so childishly the knowledge that he really wouldn't be able to protect her if the cannibals spotted them was growing with every step she took. What was she even thinking of, returning here? Why hadn't she stayed in the security of the camp? What if they're watching us already? What chance would we have? She tramped on, her eyes darting suspiciously from building to building.
They came to two petrol pumps in front of a 7-Eleven grocery store. But there was no electricity to work them. Jimmy thought if he could gain access to the underground tanks he might be able to siphon enough out to get them going again. While he tried to work out exactly how to do that Ronni quietly picked through what was left of the store — it had already been looted long ago — for something to eat. She was able to forage several bottles of Coke and a box of half-melted Hershey chocolate bars. She smiled to herself as she tucked in: if the plague and the cannibals didn't get her, the cholesterol probably would.