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England. With money at his disposal and a ten-year head start, Stephenson was poised to be the man to accomplish Isambard’s greatest dream — to build a cohesive, functioning train line between every city in England.
    After Trevethick died, Stephenson’s work had earned him — or, as Isambard claimed, bought him — the honour of being declared the Messiah of the Church of Great Conductor, the God of steam machinery whom the Stokers — along with Stephenson’s Navvies and some other, smaller churches — worshipped. As Great Conductor’s representative on earth, Stephenson had complete power over England’s expanding rail network, and he constantly blocked the proposals of smaller engineers and bought up the choice plots of land. Besides this, Stephenson was responsible — in Isambard’s mind, at least — for his father’s deportation. It was no wonder Isambard grew ever more hateful of the man he deemed his greatest rival.
    If the winner of the King’s competition were granted the position of Presbyter, then that man would have a vote in the dealings of the entire sect. Stephenson would no longer be able to ignore him, and Isambard wanted that honour more than anything.
    If only Isambard could win, which he wouldn’t.
    “I shall complete the plans shortly,” declared Isambard. “And take them to Somerset House within the week. What do you think, my friend? Do you believe I have a chance?”
    “More than a chance,” Aaron lied, lifting the tiny locomotive in his fingers and watching the pistons moving the wheels around the shaft. “We’ll be building this Wall together by next month, of that I am certain.”
    “The only problem is the exterior.” Brunel threw a set of drawings on the table. “The King favours designs with a strong aesthetic, and I have no eye for such trivialities. My Wall is ugly, and this will count against me. But I won’t have someone from the Church of Isis turn it into a Romanesque bauble. I need an industrial architect, someone who cares more for steel pylons than Corinthian columns and acanthus leaves!”
    “As fortune would have it, there is an architect just arrived in London,” Aaron said. “I met him on Tuesday, after I rescued his friend from the dragon in Kensington Garden. He has trained in France.”
    “He sounds perfect. What is his name?”
    “Nicholas Rose, although you might know him as Nicholas Thorne.”
    Brunel’s face paled. “And his friend you rescued?”
    “James Holman, the Blind Physician.”
    Brunel slumped into his chair. “Both James and Nicholas? In London — together ?”
    “Nicholas has only just returned from France under strange circumstances. How he got across the blockade he didn’t say, but they both asked after you most profusely. They are anxious to meet you, and wonder why you have not answered their letters.”
    With trembling hands, Brunel reached behind him and withdrew from the desk beside the furnace a small drawer. He tipped a stack of letters into his lap. “All unopened, all unread. I thought they blamed me for Henry’s death, for I was the one who dragged them on to the platform. I blamed myself … and then my father was sent away. I just wanted to forget, to throw myself into the world of machines. And so, I could not bring myself to answer either of them. But now it is too late. It has been so long—”
    “If they did blame you, that blame has long faded. They express only concern, and pleasure at your success.”
    Brunel’s eyes did not leave the stack of letters in his lap. “They truly do not hate me?”
    “They worry that you harbour hatred for them.”
    He looked up then, and Aaron saw the beginnings of tears glistening in the corners of his eyes. “Tell Nicholas I would be honoured to receive him, and that I have urgent work for him if he requires it.”
    ***
    Nicholas had seen the paper, too. He’d paid a matron of the guesthouse a small fortune to get him a copy of the Times with his breakfast, and