8:09 P.M.
Nehir hid alongside the gold stairs that led up to the castle. She sheltered behind a one-story home. Across the steps, Ahmad and the last remaining Son did the same. It had taken them too long to cross the breadth of the city, cautiously sticking to shadows, avoiding any of the fiery hunters, waiting for them to pass.
But Allah smiled upon her and rewarded her caution.
She leaned out enough to catch a glimpse of the palace façade thirty yards above her position. She dared go no closer. Large shapes stirred up there, shrouded in cloaks of smoke, stirring with deeper flames. A spindly-legged spider, as tall as a bus, stalked across the gates, stepping around and over others of its brethren. A smaller figure of a glowing bronze warrior with a helmet stepped to the top of the stairs.
She willed it to stay there—and Allah heard her silent prayer.
The warrior turned and vanished back into the smoke.
Behind Nehir, she heard a faint whistling laugh, so soft she wasn’t sure she had heard it. Still, it set her hairs on end. She pulled back into her hiding place and searched around her. Nothing. She glanced over to Ahmad, who still looked toward the palace, plainly having not heard anything. Nehir shook her head and rubbed an ear that still buzzed from all the grenade blasts and rifle fire.
She dropped her hand.
Enough.
She focused back to the task at hand. She and the others needed to get into that castle—either to follow her adversaries to some back door out of here or to hunt them down and exact her revenge.
Hopefully, both.
She firmed her hold on her rifle.
Nehir caught Ahmad’s attention and signaled him. Her second-in-command turned to whisper in the ear of the man behind him. The other nodded and stepped back, a grenade already in hand. He retreated far enough for a clear throw—not toward the palace but past it. The goal was to use the blast to lure the fiery guardians away from the gold gate.
The Son stared at her, waiting for her final signal.
She gave it.
He reached his arm far back—then screamed.
Something smoldering and hidden back there lunged up in a sudden burst of fire and smoke. It snapped at the Son’s outstretched arm, swallowing it whole, ripping it off at the shoulder. Blood spewed high as the man fell forward—revealing a glimpse of the massive bulk of a black dog.
Ahmad tried to get away.
Less in fear of the monster than—
The grenade exploded behind him. The dog’s head blasted apart. Shrapnel from both the grenade and pieces of the dog peppered Ahmad’s back. But her second-in-command wore full-body armor. Though wounded and knocked to his hands and knees, he crawled out onto the gold stairs.
Nehir backed away in horror.
Ahmad read her face and twisted around.
Behind him, the rest of the huge dog revealed itself, lifting two more heads into view. Diamond eyes glowed with fire; it had flames for tongues. Here was Cerebos, the three-headed guardian of Hell. One snout lunged out and caught Ahmad by the leg and lifted his struggling body high off the ground. The other head snapped onto an arm and shoulder. Then they tossed their necks wide and ripped Ahmad in half.
By then, Nehir had retreated far into the shadows.
She turned away and stared up.
While the plan with the grenade had gone awry, the blast did its job. The mass of flaming forms flowed and clambered down the gold stairs, drawn by the explosion.
She circled wide, steering a path clear of that fiery parade.
Her goal hadn’t changed.
She headed toward the gold gate.
8:10 P.M.
Elena gasped as Kadir fired at Charlie.
Charlie cringed to the side, bumping into Elena. The cliff face on the far side shattered with a three-round burst. Shards peppered the two of them, stinging and sharp.
Elena grabbed Charlie’s hand. They pulled tighter together.
Across the way, Kadir held his smoking rifle, his head slightly cocked. He had purposely missed her. But there was no leer of sadistic glee at this teasing torture. The giant remained as emotionless as ever, a cat calmly playing with a trapped pair of mice. His actions read more curious than cruel.
Still, eventually the cat kills the mice.
Kadir lifted his rifle again—clearly done with his game.
A heavy scraping of metal on stone drew all their gazes up. Apparently, someone else had heard Kadir’s noisy, capricious play. From the cavern, a massive beast leaped out. It crashed heavily between Elena and Kadir with a booming clang of bronze and a blast of smoke and fire. The ground shook with its impact. It landed in a crouch, its front low, its haunches high. A long tail swept across the cliff overhead, raining debris over the two women.
Kadir fired at it, retreating toward the burning woods.
His barrage rang off the bronze.
Charlie and Elena dropped low.
The titanic dog—a huge mastiff of metal—lunged, snapped, and grabbed Kadir before he could escape. This was no cat come to play. The beast reared up and tossed its head high. It threw Kadir’s body into the air. The giant cartwheeled, spraying blood. The mastiff roared, casting flames from its jaws, roasting the flailing man in midair.
Finally, Kadir screamed.
The mastiff caught him again and flung his body into the fiery woods.
Panicked, Charlie started for the same forest. But Elena kept hold of her hand and kept her there. Elena lifted a finger to her own lips.
Joe had told her about Mac’s experience.
Stay silent . . . don’t move.
Charlie trusted her enough to obey.
Another person had never learned that lesson.
Off to the side, Monsignor Roe hobbled away in horror. The mastiff swung toward the motion, the pained gasps. It stalked after the cleric. Roe tried to walk faster on his wounded leg, glancing back, his face shining with terror.
The hunter was also compromised—whether from the leap off the cliff or perhaps injured earlier. Elena remembered the rocket attack on the cave, on the doors inside. Had this been some guardian in there?
The mastiff dragged a hind leg and struggled with a broken elbow.
Elena straightened, watching the slow pursuit. Who would win out? The answer came a few breaths later. The mastiff drained the last of its energy and crashed headlong across the tiny streambed with a jangle of bronze. It sprawled there, neck stretched, mouth open. Its bulk still smoked, remained fiery, but clearly fading.
Roe hopped back around, sagging in relief.
Then the mastiff’s body convulsed one final time. From deep in its gullet, it cast out a new horror. Through its gaping jaws, a river of scrabbling bronze-shelled crabs exploded forth. They set fire to the stream, to themselves.
Roe froze in terror.
Then the wave reached him and climbed his body. Sharp legs speared deep into his flesh. His clothes caught fire. He writhed and spun, quickly armored in fiery bronze.
He screamed far longer than Kadir had.
Elena pushed Charlie the other way. “To the boat,” she urged.
With the deadly horde momentarily distracted, they needed to reach the cruiser. They fled through the edge of the burning forest, paralleling the tiny tributary, using the smoke and the roar of the flames to hide their passage.
When they reached the cruiser, Elena gasped and turned back upstream.
“What’s wrong?” Charlie asked.
She pointed. “The keys . . . Monsignor Roe had them.”
“Mon Dieu,” Charlie exclaimed and hopped aboard. “You don’t think I have a spare set? What sort of captain do you think I am?”
Elena followed her aboard.
A damned good one.
46
June 26, 8:13 P.M. WEST
High Atlas Mountains, Morocco
Six minutes or less . . .
Gray needed every second to pull this off.
The group hit the throne room at a full sprin
t. Even Kowalski had regained his footing, running on adrenaline, though shaky. Still, he hauled his AA-12 with him, holding on to it with white knuckles.
Maria hovered close at his side, Mac on his other.
Bailey caught up with Gray. “Where are you—?”
Gunfire exploded across the throne room, chattering across their path. Ten yards to the right, a figure hid in a side passage, down on a knee, weapon raised at them.
As they all skidded to a stop in the middle of the room, the sniper—a woman—called to them, “Where is the exit? Tell me now!”
Gray knew it was this question that had kept her from shooting them outright. She needed a way out of here as much as they did.
Kowalski sneered. “Nehir . . .”
The big man lifted his weapon, reacting with raw fury.
To discourage him, she fired again, closer to the group. Mac yelped and toppled to the side, his leg giving way as a round struck him in the foot. Blood sprayed across the stone floor.
Seichan used the distraction to whip around and fling Aggie through the air at the sniper. Caught by surprise, the monkey screeched like a banshee, arms flailing in the air. Equally caught off guard—and clearly already tense and spooked by what she must have survived to get here—Nehir fell backward, firing wildly at the monkey but missing in her panic.
Kowalski dropped to a knee and unloaded a barrage of FRAG-12 rounds into the side passage. The explosive shells boomed and rattled there, filling the space with smoke and fire.
He shifted ahead to reposition, but Gray followed and pushed the big weapon aside, discouraging Kowalski from shooting again. They might need that firepower later, and they were down to the last drum magazine.
Besides, Seichan was already moving, SIG in hand. She swept through the billow of smoke and out the other side. She gave a shake of her head with a frown.
Nehir had vanished.
Gray checked his watch. Five minutes. They had no time to hunt the woman down. He looked over to Mac.
The man wore a pained expression. “I can hop.”
Maria already had an arm around his waist. “I got him.”
Gray pointed to the exit. “Move it.”
Seichan paused long enough to retrieve Aggie. The monkey looked pissed and scared. She extended an arm. “Sorry about that, little one,” she said in the same soothing tones she used with Jack.
Aggie chirped, still plainly irritated, but he leaped, scampered up her arm to her shoulder, and hugged close to her cheek.
Gray led the way toward the exit, praying they still had enough time.
“Where are we going?” Bailey pressed.
Gray had no time to explain and pointed back at the thrones as they left the hall. “The answer’s back there.”
Hopefully I’m right.
8:14 P.M.
Nehir dragged her broken leg down the hall of the castle. Her femur stuck through the fabric. Blood trailed behind her. She kept one hand on a wall and shuffled deeper into the palace, seeking the comfort of shadows to hide in.
The only reason she was still alive was a combination of instinct and Kevlar. She had leaped away at the last moment when the American had fired at her. Still, a shell had burst too close, with enough force to shatter her leg. She lost her weapon, but adrenaline kept her moving. First crawling, then eventually standing.
She finally found a dark enough place to collapse, where no fiery torches burned. Along the way, she had noted that the golden flames in the bronze brands along the walls had grown ever smaller, feebler, as if about to be snuffed out.
She didn’t know why.
Didn’t care.
She sank with her back to the wall, appreciating the cooler darkness. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. Time skipped a beat as she briefly passed out. A noise woke her. The hallway was even darker now. Her heart pounded in fear.
The sound came from the shadows ahead.
Whistling laughter.
She had heard it before, out in the city. Goose bumps pebbled her flesh. She focused on the source of that laughter.
What is—?
Then it appeared out of the gloom, shedding its shadows.
A glowing bronze boy shambled into view, its head hanging crookedly. It dragged a leg, as broken as hers. Fire and smoke haloed its form. From its lips, frozen in a grinning rictus, another whistling cackle flowed.
The boy came straight at her, perhaps drawn by her gasping breaths.
Once it was close enough, she tried to kick it away with her good leg, but molten hands caught her ankle and tightened. She screamed as fiery bronze burned through Kevlar down to flesh. She writhed, knocking it over on its side. But still it held. Its limbs paddled in the air. Then slowly, like the guttering torches, it stopped and went still with one last thin reed of laughter.
She tried to loosen its grip—then new movement ahead froze her.
Out of the gloom, two new figures appeared, far smaller, but their surfaces glowed even hotter. They crawled toward her, two bronze babies, a boy and a girl.
No . . .
A moan escaped her. She tried to get away, but one leg was shattered, the other trapped, pinned by hundreds of pounds of bronze. She scooted against the wall, turning her face away.
The boy reached her broken leg, then climbed. Each touch burned through the fabric of her trousers, searing her skin. The girl clambered straight between her legs and crawled upward, tracing a fiery path.
Nehir shook her head—not at the blistering flesh, but at what had come for her. Demonic mockeries of her two babies. She cried and writhed. With effort, she could have knocked them away, but even now, she could not bring herself to do so.
If this is Allah’s punishment . . .
If this is all I’m allowed . . .
The two bronze babes reached her bosom, melting through her armor, reaching her skin, and continuing to scorch their way down toward her heart.
So be it . . .
She reached her arms and cradled her two children closer. Pain and shock eventually blurred her vision. She stared down at their soft little bodies. Feeling them settle and grow quiet.
My little girl, Huri . . . my sweet little boy.
She held them until they all stopped moving.
47
June 26, 8:15 P.M. WEST
High Atlas Mountains, Morocco
Four minutes to go . . .
Gray led the others down the gold stairway. All around, Tartarus had grown darker as torches flickered out. He pictured the closed valve, shutting off the fuel source to the city. But dangers persisted.
As they raced down the stairs, Kowalski’s weapon fired in bursts all around. The FRAG-12 shells blasted back anything that threatened: a bronze centaur, a sleek hound, a flame-maned lion. Still, even these attacks seemed far more sluggish as the Promethean flames that fueled the guardians dimmed.
Gray noticed that several had retreated to their bronze pedestals, perhaps following some predetermined program to return for refueling when their power ebbed.
He had no time to give these mysteries more than a passing thought. Back at the foundry’s radiative pool, he had noticed pipes running from Hunayn’s fail-safe device down into the volatile oil. If that pool blew, especially considering all the residual oil still in the city’s plumbing, the explosion would end up being the mother of all air-fuel bombs.
It could blow the top off this mountain.
We don’t want to be here when that happens.
Gray finally neared the bottom of the golden staircase and checked his watch.
Three minutes . . .
Bailey drew alongside him, followed by Seichan and Maria, who practically carried Mac between them. The climatologist’s face was tight with pain, pale with blood loss and shock.
Bailey searched ahead and was astute enough by now to reason out Gray’s plan. “How are we supposed to get out that exit?”
“What exit?” Kowalski asked, panting up behind them, still watching for any threa
t, his weapon braced on his hip.
“Down there.” Bailey pointed to the dark lake, to the water still flowing in from five directions to feed the slowly churning whirlpool in the city’s center. “Down the maw of Charybdis.”
Kowalski frowned. “I’ve already had my swim for the day, and I don’t feel like being sucked down to nowhere.”
“Smell the water,” Gray said. “It’s fresh seawater. This is just one big circulating pump. From the ocean to here and back out again.”
Mac heard him, perhaps concentrating on their talk versus his pain. “According to a compass reading I took before, this cavern does angle toward the sea, but the ocean still has to be a mile off.”
Bailey frowned at Gray. “Then how do you propose to—?”
They reached the end of the gold stairs and Gray pointed to the circle of bronze fish around the lake. “We’ll take the Phaeacians’ subs.”
8:16 P.M.
He’s finally lost it . . .
Kowalski climbed off the last step and gaped at the huge ring of fish. There were hundreds, each tilted at an angle, as if ready to spray water and create a fountain worthy of Vegas.
Kowalski rushed after Gray. “Why do you think they’re submarines?”
“As we said before, the Phaeacians were no fools. They wouldn’t trap themselves down here without an escape route.”
Kowalski pointed to the massive whirlpool. “And you think that’s their escape route?”
“By necessity, it would have to be centrally located. And that’s as central as you can get.”
“But still . . .”
“Plus, the thrones,” Gray added. “Sculpted there in gold, you can see these same curl-tailed fish depicted, plying the seas alongside the Phaeacians’ ships.”
As proof, Gray took them to one of the bronze fish. It was the size of a minivan, but he found footholds down one flank and clambered up.
Movement drew Kowalski’s gaze higher.
Charybdis wasn’t the only Greek monster here.
On the far side of the lake, a six-headed crocodilian dragon swung all of its heads toward Gray. Drawn by the motion, their chatter, or maybe Gray’s trespass.
“I think you’re pissing someone off,” Kowalski warned. “And this time, it’s not me.”
The Last Odyssey: A Thriller Page 37
