9. Doorways and Webs

Weiwei doesn't think about what she is doing, only moves toward Grey and the sleek silver gun in his hands. She knows what is inside the syringe—a strong concoction distilled from poppy seed. "Harmless," the doctor says, but she has seen its effects and she knows this is not true. She cannot let such poison run in Elena's veins. Alexei is shouting her name, but she has eyes only for the gun, she is pushing it away; away from Elena, toward the lichen that is creeping across the ceiling in waves of silver and blue.

The dart flies out, pinning itself into the scales of the lichen—

—and pain floods over her, as if something is tearing at her sinews. She falls into darkness.

—When she opens her eyes, what must be only seconds later, she sees Suzuki crouched on the floor, Marya hurrying toward him; sees the scales of lichen on the ceiling and the pale threads across the floor; feels the train and the earth, and the earth and the train, woven together, and she is part of it too, she feels the point of the dart where it is embedded in the lichen; where the drug is spilling out.

"Are you hurt?" Alexei is leaning over her, patting her shoulders as if expecting to find a wound, and Weiwei tries to say Yes but she doesn't understand how she is hurt, only that there is a dull, thudding ache in all of her limbs, she doesn't know how to frame the words; she doesn't know how to separate the different parts of the scene before her.

Here is Elena, unmoving. Watching Weiwei with such intensity that she seems unaware of anyone else in the carriage.

Here is Henry Grey, grappling with the mechanics of the gun, his hands slipping on its bolt. She could tear it from him, if she could just make her legs work properly, but he seems to be getting further away, the closer she moves. She tries to form the words to tell Elena—Run!—but her mouth is too dry.

And behind her, a new set of footsteps, fast and light and determined. The Captain. Breach protocol, thinks Weiwei. The Captain could order not just a tranquilizer dart but any means necessary, she could call the gunner down from the watchtower to train his sights on Elena. She tries again to call out, to tell her to run, there is too much danger here, but no sound emerges. The Professor is approaching Elena, his arms held out as if to reassure a child. But the stowaway pays him no attention. She is looking up at where the dart is pinned to the scales of lichen in the ceiling, where darker veins are zigzagging out from beneath its point, as if they have drunk its poison, and Weiwei can feel the pulsing of the drug through her own veins, dulling her mind, making her thoughts sluggish and confused. Why is Alexei shaking her? She can't read the expression on his face, is he angry? Weiwei is not doing her job, there is somewhere she should be, she mustn't slack—

A clatter on the floor sends a wave of pain through her. Grey has dropped the gun, he is moving toward Elena, his hands together as if in supplication, but no, there is something in his hands, light glints off a silvery needle. He is holding one of the syringes for the dart gun; she is just another specimen, something to be trapped and held behind glass.

Elena leaps. It is not a movement any human could make. It leaves Grey falling forward, jabbing his syringe into empty space. It is an impossible leap onto the wall, clinging on in a tangle of limbs before springing onto the ceiling, spider-like, where she grabs hold of the dart and wrenches it from where it is embedded.

Weiwei feels the release, the waves of deeper blue racing through the lichen like water cooling a fever.

But she also feels the Captain go rigid beside her. She sees Alexei freeze, horror on his face. Realization. A Wastelands creature on the train. There is no disguising what Elena is, now. She crouches in the corner of the ceiling as if poised to pounce, looking down on them all.

Weiwei sees Alexei reach for the dart gun that Grey has dropped.

"No—" She manages only a whisper, but when he turns toward her Elena leaps again, landing lightly on all fours, keeping her eyes on Weiwei alone. Now run, go! she wants to shout. Hide away and don't show yourself again—they will keep coming after you, with their needles and guns—you are not welcome here. And she thinks that Elena understands, because with a final look the stowaway turns and plunges into the next carriage.

Henry Grey follows, with an inarticulate cry, pushing the Professor roughly aside.

Weiwei tries to get up. She has to stop him, she has to warn Elena that he is dangerous, this man, that though he may seem clumsy and foolish to her, there is a fanatical light in his eyes, but her legs buckle, and then Alexei and the Captain are on either side of her, holding her up.

"Steady now," says the Captain, and the thought flashes through Weiwei's mind that she has chosen to stay here, with her, rather than to follow in pursuit, and it is a thought that needs looking at, carefully, but Alexei is speaking, and there is barely contained anger in his voice.

"You knew it was here," he says.

"She," Weiwei says. Her mouth is still dry but the words are returning. "Her name is Elena and she won't hurt us, she—"

"Won't hurt us?" Alexei interrupts her. "Her presence is enough to hurt us. Did you not think there would be consequences? Did you not even think about the Vigil, about what will happen to all of us?"

"You're hardly one to speak," she snaps, and she is transported instantly back to their younger squabbles, to each of them accusing the other of their own misdeeds, to the outrage of perceived slights or injustices.

"Enough!" says the Captain.

Further down the carriage, Weiwei is aware of Suzuki protesting to Marya and the Professor that he is quite well. Above them, lichen creeps across the ceiling.

"No," says Weiwei. "No, let me speak. She won't hurt us—it isn't her fault, what's happening. And it isn't yours, either." She holds Alexei's eyes, long enough, she is sure, to convince him. He has gone so still, he hardly seems to be breathing. The Captain's expression, if you didn't know her well, has hardly changed. But Weiwei can read the smallest thinning of her lips, the movement of muscle beneath her eye. The Captain believes what has happened is her fault. The guilt has been eating her up.

Weiwei thinks—and it is a cruel, selfish thought—Let her feel guilty a little longer.

"I have to find Elena," she says to the Captain. "Grey doesn't understand her, he will try to catch her, they will hurt each other. Please, let me go." But it is not just Grey who doesn't understand, it is Elena. Elena who watches and mimics and believes that this means that she understands how people work, but there are cruelties she doesn't grasp, like the urge to trap and display, to possess for the sake of possessing.

The Captain is silent. She is weighing up the possibilities, as she always has done. This is still her train, thinks Weiwei, with a flicker of hope; she is still their Captain.

"Go," she says. "I will deal with what is happening elsewhere."

"But how will she follow them?" Alexei is looking toward the other end of the carriage, where criss-crossing the door to the infirmary are countless white threads, and as Weiwei moves closer she sees that they are woven into a web that is still moving, growing, blocking the path to Elena and Henry Grey.

"Don't touch them," says the Captain, and Weiwei can hear the fear in her voice, but she disobeys—she puts out her hand to them, and watches as they move and overlap, as if they are opening a door for her.

"Grey still has two syringes," says Alexei, abruptly. "Be careful."

The Captain gives the barest of nods.

Weiwei looks out of the window, through the gaps left by the blooms of mold. In the distance, a dark line appears. A first glimpse of the Russian Wall.

She pushes aside the threads and steps through the door.