Dead Iron

EPILOGUE

Mr. Shunt sat cross-legged in the shadows by the shattered and burned train car, the last bits of him hooked, stretched, and sewn into place. It had been a slow and grueling process to piece himself back together, and he had used spare parts from the other Strangeworks to fill the holes Jeb Lindson and that cursed man Cedar Hunt had left in him.

His gray, gore-covered coat wrapped him from chin to boot, his face hidden beneath layers of silk and cotton and his stovepipe hat.

He was looking for something. Waiting for one thing more to finish his construction.

There. A dull glint, movement in the bloody soil.

He bent and plucked up a delicate silver dragonfly. He held it in his open palm, and the crystal wings shivered sparks of color in the late-afternoon light.

Such a precious thing. So rare. And now it had no cage to hold it.

Mr. Shunt pressed it into his chest, piecing it together, stitching it a new cage, just as he had pieced himself together anew. Then he took the iron key from his pocket and wound the dragonfly until its wings hummed.

Too great of a treasure to waste on that dead man. Now the dragonfly was where it belonged. Now Mr. Shunt would see that his own desires, his own hungers, were fulfilled.

And that which he wanted most was traveling east.

So east was where he’d go.

He strode down the rail, heading east on the dead iron rails, the sun a burning ember behind him, and all the land spread before him, like a feast of dreams.