The Impossible Future: Complete set by Frank Kennedy (mini ebook reader .txt) 📕

their horses’ reins. They charged out behind the passing train, another six allies emerging from the tree line on the far side of the tracks. They proceeded with a disciplined adherence to the plan Rayna devised with Kamily.

The train screeched as it bellowed excess steam. Before the wheels made their final rotation, the rescuers assumed positions on all sides. Two guarded either side of the engine. Two dismounted their steeds and leaped onboard the first car. Three remained on horseback, their rifles aimed at the most important car. The Chancellor observers raced to the forward door of that car, while Rayna leaped from her horse and joined Kamily at the rear. They boarded the steps and stood abreast the door, their rifles high.

“We go with God,” Kamily said before they attacked.

Rayna grabbed the latch, threw open the door, and rushed inside. She aimed, ready to take out Father’s guards, one by one. Two of the last four Chancellor observers who crossed the fold assaulted from the front of the car.

They encountered no resistance.

“What is this?” Rayna said.

The seats were empty, save for one man in a suit who sat snug against a window, his back to Rayna. The Chancellors locked eyes in dismay. She feared the worst: Her intelligence was wrong. How deadly would this miscalculation prove?

“Forward,” she told the observers. “Now. We…”

The Mentor appeared in the car’s mid-section, checking his pocket watch. She saw his astonishment.

“How did I not anticipate this, my dearest child?” Mentor said. “I always saw what Alexei was, but these other savages…”

A cold fever swept through the cabin. Rayna sensed it before she confirmed it. She raced forward three rows and aimed her rifle at the lone passenger sitting in silence.

He carried a stately presence: A suit well-tailored with an embroidered handkerchief, a carefully coiffed beard of salt gray, a top hat worn only by the aristocracy.

And vacant eyes that saw forever and no more.

Rayna lowered the rifle.

“Father.”

Pyotr Tsukanov did not respond. His daughter knew he was dead – too far gone for the Jewel inside her to save him. And even so, she moved closer, trapped between a grief she realized would be her death and a reckless rage to strike out at her enemies.

A newspaper lay in Pyotr’s lap, with a hand-drawn message in red scrawled across the front page.

Смерть узурпаторам

DEATH TO THE USURPERS.

Rayna heard this message often from those who never trusted the Tsukanovs, never believed they were true Cossacks.

“Father,” she said again, this time noticing a thin red line encircling his neck above the jacket. “Savages.” She faced the Mentor, who sighed.

“My dearest, I wish I had foreseen this folly. They wish to finish us as they tried fifteen years ago.”

As if on startling cue, shots blasted through windows. Glass flew inward, and the Chancellors who joined her on this rescue fiasco twisted about and yelped as a storm of bullets shredded them.

Rayna faced Kamily Doroshenko and stared into the barrel of his rifle. His aim was not as steady as in previous years, his age a frequent challenge. Still, the barrel rested point-blank from her heart. Rayna found no room for tears as she understood the depth of the betrayal.

“What did that demon Vasily Shkuro promise you?”

“Protection, Rayna. For my household, here and far. For my family name. For a name that dominated this countryside generations before the Tsukanovs arrived.” He dropped a tear. “Know this, Rayna Tsukanova. I have loved you and your father as my own. My dearest wife and daughters would be with God if not for you. But Vasily, he is bent on ending all Tsukanovs.”

The picture came into focus; she’d been a fool. “And he has the backing of every major household in Kiev. No?”

“He does.”

“Why this way, Kamily? Why bring us here to betray us?”

Kamily swallowed hard. “Vasily wants your bodies delivered to Kiev. Payment from the Doroshenkos. The other Tsukanovs were heading north, but they have surely been taken by my men. Their bodies will be brought here. When the barrier is cleared, we will deliver the seven of you to Kiev. Vasily will be waiting at the depot.”

Rayna stiffened her shoulders and her resolve.

“No, Kamily Doroshenko, you are wrong. This train will never reach Kiev, and that bastard Vasily Shkuro will never see his gift.”

She tossed aside her rifle and grabbed the hilt of her shashka.

“You have lost all honor today, Kamily. But you wish to regain some measure of that honor. No? Kill me in the way of a true Cossack, not by putting a bullet through my heart.”

His eyes revealed his humiliation. Just over his shoulders, the Mentor nodded.

“Careful, dearest,” Mentor said. “His is a weaker mind, but the property of a stubborn old man. He may choose the simple path.”

Kamily stepped back two paces and lowered the rifle.

“I stand corrected,” Mentor said. “He does still have a slice of honor. Kill him quickly, dearest. The fold awaits.”

21

R AYNA LEARNED ABOUT DEATH on her third birthday, less than two months after she set foot on this primitive version of Earth. They came for two of her “uncles,” Chancellors who ignored local Cossack customs. Her father saved her during the attack, but he did not spare her from the sight of men slashed by masters of the blade.

Pyotr tried to keep her safe, teaching her the etiquette and responsibilities of a Cossack girl. Yet her mind twisted in many directions after the Mentor appeared out of nowhere on her seventh birthday. He showed her other worlds, other possibilities.

She learned, she watched, she waited for her moment.

Seven years later, she tracked the son of a Cossack who killed her “uncles” and gutted him along the banks of the Dnieper. No witnesses, no reprisals. But the blood….

“You