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I knew they were right, but I still hesitated. “Well, if you’re sure you don’t need me to call for a ride and head that way . . .”
Finn rolled his eyes. “We’re fine, Gin. It’s just a little traffic jam. It’s not like black-clad villains are running around wild and we’re all in mortal danger again.”
Bria shoved her elbow into his side, making him hiss with pain. “Don’t jinx us. We’re still on vacation until the end of the day, remember?”
Finn gave her a sour look and rubbed his ribs, but he didn’t say anything else.
“Finn’s right,” Owen chimed in. “Go on the train ride, and we’ll be waiting at the Pine Crest station to pick you up this afternoon. And if the food isn’t as good as advertised, then at least you’ll have some blueberry muffins to look forward to, right?”
He waggled the paper bag, and I smiled back at him.
“Okay, then, I’ll see you all in a couple of hours. Oh, and Finn?”
“Yeah?” he said, leaning toward the screen.
“If you eat all my blueberry muffins—”
Finn huffed, cutting off my warning. “I know, I know. You’ll kill me. Slowly. Painfully. Deliberately. Really take your time. Really make it hurt.”
“So you were listening earlier,” I drawled. “Excellent. I do so hate having to repeat myself.”
He huffed again. “I wonder if I’m the only person who has to deal with death threats from their sister the assassin on a regular basis.”
I snorted. “In Ashland? Please. There are more family feuds in our city than customers at the Pork Pit.”
Finn tipped his head in agreement. “Either way, enjoy the trip. Oh, and Gin?”
“Yeah?”
He winked at me. “Try not to kill anybody today, okay?”
I glanced around at the cutesy shops lining the storybook-looking street that ran in front of the train station. “Somehow I don’t think that will be a problem. This place is about as far away from Ashland as we could get and still be in the Appalachian Mountains.”
Finn chuckled at my words, as did Bria and Owen. I joined in with their laughter, but a small, nagging part of me wondered if Bria was right—and if Finn had just jinxed us all with his talk of villains and killing.
I ended the call, slid my phone into the back pocket of my jeans, and headed inside the train station. Just like the rest of Pine Crest, the station was colorful, charming, and immaculate, with beige brick, glossy black wooden beams, and stained-glass windows featuring, you guessed it, trains. Black wrought-iron chandeliers shaped like train wheels and studded with bare bulbs dangled from the high ceiling, while old-fashioned lampposts shaped like pine trees stood at the ends of the wooden benches that lined the walls.
Dozens of people were milling about in the main lobby, checking their phones and drinking coffee, and everyone seemed happy, relaxed, and cheerful. But I knew how deceiving looks could be, so I took up a position in the far corner, close to one of the wide archways that led into the back of the station, and studied everyone around me. I didn’t spot any immediate, obvious threats, so I reached out with my magic, listening to the brick walls.
People leave emotional vibrations behind in whatever stone is around them, and as a Stone elemental, I can hear and interpret all those feelings, from amusement to annoyance to murderous rage. But the brick walls only whistled about all the trains that had rumbled through the station over the years, along with the hurried, harried passengers who were eager to board and get to their next destination, wherever it might be.
A woman opened a metal door marked Employees Only and stepped through one of the archways close to the corner where I was standing. She was about my age, early thirties, with dark brown eyes and tan skin. Her blond hair was sleeked back into a low ponytail, and she was sporting an old-fashioned conductor’s uniform of a black suit jacket with shiny gold buttons over a ruffled white shirt and black pants with a thick gold stripe running down each leg. The only thing that ruined her polished, professional look was her footwear. Instead of shiny black wing tips to match the rest of her spiffy uniform, the conductor was sporting scuffed, stained, brown hiking boots.
A brimmed black hat trimmed with gold thread topped the conductor’s head, and she stopped and tugged it down, as if something had knocked it askew. She also ran her hands down her jacket, smoothing it into place.
The woman spotted me, and she turned and smiled. “You here for the trip, ma’am?”
I nodded. “Yep.”
Her smile widened, and she nodded back at me. “Excellent. I’m Winifred. I’ll be your conductor today. See you on board.”
I nodded at her again. She flashed me another smile, then stepped through the archway, moved deeper into the station, and vanished from view.
“Attention, passengers. Now boarding. The ten o’clock Lunch and Look tour,” a voice announced through the station’s crackling intercom system. “Please have your tickets ready and start making your way out to the tracks, and we’ll be under way shortly.”
I plucked my phone out of my pocket, pulled up the text and ticket info that Finn had sent me, and got in line with everyone else. As the group slowly snaked toward the archways, I noticed a girl standing alone in the opposite corner and surveying the people in the lobby, just as I had done earlier. And just like me, she had her arms crossed over her chest, and a wary look filled her face.
The girl couldn’t have been more than eighteen, but she seemed far more suspicious than excited about the trip. She reached up and ran a hand down her dark brown hair, although her thick locks immediately frizzed out to where they had been before, despite her halfhearted attempt to tame them. A gray messenger bag was slung across the girl’s chest, and something odd was sticking up out of the side. Did she play some kind of sport? Was that a hockey stick? I squinted, but I couldn’t quite make out exactly what the shape was—
