Stranded

She looked toward the front of the car. Passengers had already risen from their seats. A man in a green sweater leaned into the aisle, craning for a view past the connecting door. The glass showed only a pale blur.

“Maybe we hit something,” someone said.

“We’re on a mountain,” another voice answered. “What would we hit?”

The question moved through the car faster than any announcement.

Rowan’s hand found the zipper of Ben’s coat and pulled it to his chin. Her immediate need was simple: keep the children beside her and find out what had stopped the train before fear turned into panic. She had packed snacks, extra socks, a small blanket, and the red inhaler June needed when cold air tightened her chest. Everything else could wait.

A burst of static cracked from the ceiling speaker.

“Ladies and gentlemen, please remain seated while our crew assesses the - ”

The message broke into a wash of static.

June looked up. “Mom?”

“I heard him.” Rowan forced her voice steady. “We’re going to stay together.”

Three young men near the rear door laughed. They had been loud since Anchorage, passing a bottle between them beneath the table. One wore a green velvet jacket over a shirt with a reindeer tie. Another had a flushed face and a Santa hat tilted over one ear. The third leaned against the wall, eyes glassy, gripping the overhead rail.

“Assessment,” the man in the velvet jacket said. “That means nobody knows anything.”

“Sit down,” a woman told him.

He grinned. “I am sitting down.”

“You’re standing.”

“Details.”

The train gave a sudden sideways jolt. A suitcase dropped from the luggage rack and struck the floor hard enough to split its clasp. June cried out. Ben buried his face in Rowan’s coat.

Rowan stood, keeping one hand on each child. “Stay here.”

“Where are you going?” June asked.

“To find the conductor.”

The aisle was already clogged. Coats brushed Rowan’s shoulders. Someone had opened the connecting door, and a gust of freezing air knifed through the gap. Snow skittered across the floor in bright grains before melting against the carpet.

Rowan moved forward with Ben’s hand locked in hers and June close against her hip. The train’s stopped position had thrown everyone into the same narrow passage. A man blocked the way with a camera bag. Two women argued over whether the emergency windows could open. A toddler wailed behind them.

“Please,” Rowan said. “I need to get through.”

The man shifted an inch. “Crew’s in the next car.”

“Thank you.”

She had taken three steps when the velvet-jacketed lad stumbled into the aisle behind her.

“Move,” he said.

Rowan turned. “There are children here.”

“So I noticed.”

His breath carried whiskey. He reached for the rail, missed, and slammed shoulder-first into a seat. The other two laughed until the train gave another low groan.

“Back to your seats,” a deep voice called. “The mountain has heard enough from you.”

An older man had risen beside the window. He wore a navy wool coat, a red scarf, and the expression of someone who had spent his life refusing to be impressed by bad weather.

The drunk lad squinted at him. “You the mountain?”

“No, son. I’m Walter Beck. Retired school principal, amateur magician, and the only man aboard this train who can make three idiots disappear.”

A few passengers laughed despite themselves.

Walter pointed toward the seats. “The trick begins when you sit down.”

The lad muttered something, but his friend caught his sleeve. “Come on, Dex.”

Rowan gave Walter a quick nod. “Thank you.”

“Keep those little ones close,” he said. “Mountains are poor hosts, and storms have no manners.”

She pushed through the connecting door.

The next car was worse. Passengers packed the aisle, faces turned toward the front. The conductor was nowhere in sight. A service cart had broken loose and wedged across the passage, its wheels ticking as the train settled on the rails.

“Where’s the crew?” Rowan called.

No one answered.

She climbed over a fallen duffel, dragging Ben after her. June held the back of Rowan’s coat with both hands. The farther forward they went, the colder it became. The floor trembled beneath their boots, not with motion but with the engine’s uneven struggle.

A uniformed attendant appeared near the end of the car, bracing herself against the wall.

“Is the conductor up front?” Rowan asked.

“He’s with the engineer.”

“Why have we stopped?”

The attendant glanced toward the sealed door ahead. “A drift across the track. They’re checking the line.”

“How long?”

“I don’t know.”

“Can we get off?”

The attendant’s face tightened. “Absolutely not.”

Outside, a dull thump struck the side of the train. Then another. Snow packed against the windows until the world became white.

Rowan thought of the pass beyond the glass: steep slopes, narrow track, and nothing between the train and the drop except steel and frozen ground. “Is the train secure?”

“We’re secure,” the attendant said, but her eyes moved toward the ceiling speaker.

That was not an answer.

June coughed.

It was a small sound, but Rowan heard every rough edge in it. She pulled the girl close and felt the cold fabric of her coat beneath her fingers.

“We’re going back,” Rowan said.

“To our seats?” Ben asked.

“To a warmer car.”

The attendant caught her wrist. “The rear lounge has more people and a functioning heater. Take them there. Stay away from the forward cars until we know what’s happening.”

“Will someone tell us?”

“If the radio comes back.”

Rowan wanted to demand more. She wanted a name, a time, a promise that the train would start moving before June needed her inhaler. Instead, she nodded and turned around.

The return was slower. Fear had filled the cars while she was gone. Passengers crowded the doorways, clutching phones that showed no signal. A man kept refreshing a weather app as if the screen might clear the storm. Near the dining car, a woman sobbed into her gloves.

The three drunken lads had followed.

“Hey,” the one in the Santa hat called. “Lady. You know what’s going on?”

Rowan kept walking. “No.”

“Crew won’t tell us.”

“Then don’t make it worse.”

Dex laughed. “That’s rich. We’re the entertainment.”

He slapped the emergency cabinet as he passed. The metal rang through the car.

Ben flinched. June’s fingers tightened around Rowan’s.

Walter Beck stepped into the aisle between them. “Young man, if you touch that cabinet again, I’ll have to report you.”

“To who?”

“To the conductor, once he finishes saving us from your personality.”

The Santa-hat lad snorted. “Old timer thinks he’s funny.”

“No,” Walter said. “I know I’m funny. It’s one of the few luxuries retirement affords.”

A woman near him smiled weakly. Walter turned to the passengers. “Everyone take a breath. The train has stopped, but it has not vanished. We are still indoors, still together, and there are enough holiday cookies in the dining car to outlast most governments.”

“Are there?” someone asked.

“Not after I’m finished.”

The joke loosened something in the car. A few people laughed. Even June lifted her head.

Rowan used the opening to guide her children toward the rear lounge. Walter followed, walking at their pace.

The lounge was warmer but crowded with coats, luggage, and frightened bodies. The windows were completely blind with snow. A red emergency lamp glowed above the far door, painting the passengers’ faces the color of embers.

Rowan found a corner booth beneath a heater vent and settled Ben beside her. June climbed in after him, still holding Rowan’s coat.

“Stay here,” Rowan said. “I’m going to ask about the heat and the fuel.”

June’s eyes widened. “Fuel?”

Rowan regretted the word at once.

Walter lowered himself into the seat across from them. “Fuel is what makes a train go,” he said gently. “And this one has plenty of people who know how to find more.”

“Does it?” June asked.

Walter’s smile held. “I have never met a problem improved by children worrying about it before the grown-ups do.”

Rowan squeezed his shoulder. “Watch them for one minute.”

“Gladly.”

She crossed to the crew door. It was locked. A narrow window showed the vestibule beyond, where the conductor stood with a radio pressed to his ear. His face was pale beneath the dim light.

Rowan knocked.

He looked over but did not open the door.

She knocked again. “My children are in the lounge. I need to know what’s happening.”

The conductor approached and cracked the door. Cold air spilled through the opening.

“Ma’am, please return to your seat.”

“We’re not moving.”

“We’re dealing with a drift.”

“You said that twenty minutes ago.”

His jaw tightened. “The storm has buried the track faster than we can clear it.”

Rowan glanced past him. Snow swirled through the vestibule, blowing beneath the outer door. “Can rescue reach us?”

“Not in this weather.”

The words landed harder than she expected.

“What does that mean?”

“It means no helicopter can fly in these conditions. We have to clear the line ourselves.”

“And the heat?”

He hesitated.

Rowan saw it then - not panic, exactly, but calculation. His eyes flicked toward the front of the train.

“How much fuel is left?” she asked.

“Enough for now.”

“That isn’t a number.”

“Mrs. Hale - ”

“How much?”

The conductor looked down the corridor, as if hoping someone else would answer. “The locomotive’s fuel is dangerously low. We’re conserving power.”

Behind Rowan, the lounge fell quiet.

She turned. Faces had lifted toward her. Walter’s expression had lost its humor. June watched from the booth, one hand resting on Ben’s head.

“How long will the heat last?” Rowan asked.

The conductor’s voice dropped. “I can’t promise it through the night.”

A tremor passed through the passengers.

Then the three lads shoved into the vestibule from behind, drawn by the word fuel.

“Dangerously low?” Dex said. “That sounds bad.”

“Back away from the door,” the conductor ordered.

“Open it,” the Santa-hat lad said. “We can walk.”

“No one is walking anywhere,” Walter called.

The train groaned again, and the floor tilted beneath them. Rowan grabbed the doorframe. Through the window, a wall of snow pressed close enough to touch.

She thought of the pass outside, of the darkness waiting beyond the metal shell, and of June’s cough growing rougher in the cold.

“Close the door,” Rowan said.

The conductor stared at her.

“Close it,” she repeated. “Get everyone into the heated lounge. If the train loses power, we need the children together.”

It was not permission. It was the only decision available.

The conductor shut the door and locked it. Rowan returned to the booth, pulled both children into her arms, and wrapped the small blanket around their shoulders. Walter shifted to make room.

For several minutes, no one spoke. The heater rattled overhead. Snow hammered the windows. Somewhere forward, metal struck metal in a slow, hollow rhythm.

Then the lights flickered.

Once.

Twice.

They did not go out, but beneath the red emergency lamp, a panel near the ceiling came alive. Three amber warning lights blinked in sequence, followed by a fourth red light that stayed on.

A display beside it flashed a message.

FUEL RESERVE: CRITICAL.

Walter read it aloud, quietly enough that only Rowan heard.

The locomotive gave one last shudder.

Outside, the blizzard sealed the train against the mountain, and inside the lounge, the heater began to cool.

End of chapter one. 32 more chapters in the full book.