(eng) Peter F. Hamilton - Queen of Dreams 02 by The Hunting of the Princes (retail)

Author:The Hunting of the Princes (retail) [Princes, The Hunting of the]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

A TUNNEL INSIDE A TUNNEL

Taggie emerged back out into the tiny alleyway, squeezing her eyes against the bright sunlight. She led her friends down the slope to the Meadows. Five minutes later they were standing on the eastbound platform of Stamford’s railway station. It was a lovely little station, with the booking office built out of the same mild yellow sandstone as the rest of the town. The waiting room on the other platform was a Victorian wooden cabin with a canopy roof supported by iron pillars. At the end of the platforms an iron footbridge straddled the tracks. Taggie and her friends gathered there, looking along the tracks to the entrance of the tunnel, barely four hundred metres away. It was a simple rectangle at the end of a brick-walled cutting, with two slim, arched road bridges between them and it. A train had just left the station as they arrived. Now there was nobody left on either platform.

‘Come on,’ Taggie urged. ‘Before someone sees us.’ She jogged down the ramp at the end of the platform and started along the side of the track. Felix scampered past her, holding his tail horizontal as he always did when he ran. Their feet crunching on the loose-packed stone seemed to make far too much noise inside the high cutting, with every footfall echoing guiltily between the dark-blue brick walls.

They ran under the first road bridge, then the second. Sophie took her coat off as they reached the tunnel entrance itself, then kicked her oversized boots away. Her wings began to flap, and her feathered feet unfurled. She hovered a few inches above the tracks.

‘Oh, that’s better,’ she sighed. ‘Those clothes were like being in chains.’

Taggie grinned and took her friend’s hat. Sophie’s red hair expanded outward and floated about placidly in the air.

They were poised on the edge of the shadow cast by the tunnel entrance. Unseen above them, a lorry growled along the road. Taggie realized they were all waiting for her to step inside. With a shrug she started forward again. It would be another hour before the next train. Their schedule was very regular.

Felix, who had expanded up to waist-height, put on his purple-lens revealor glasses. Lantic noticed him do it, and rummaged round in his satchel for a similar pair. Jemima made a show of putting on hers. Felix did a quick double-take. Jemima’s smug expression halted any comment he might have made.

Unlike the cutting outside, the tunnel seemed to absorb sound. They moved forward cautiously. Felix held up his paw, and rich yellow light shone out from his ring, casting a pale circle of light. The tunnel entrance shrank away behind them.

Liquids dripped unseen in the darkness. The air was a lot colder. Lantic shivered, and not entirely from the chill. He made his way over to Felix. ‘I wonder if I might ask you a question?’ he asked quietly. ‘It is a delicate one.’

Felix’s nose twitched. ‘Bodyguards are fully familiar with discretion, Prince.’

‘Uh, right then.

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