by Anni Taylor
“I followed him for a few hours.” I stiffened as I recalled his words about Kara.
Jennifer shot me a look of alarm. “You followed him? That’s a risky thing to do. Very risky. Wilson is certainly unusual, in that he’s much more flamboyant than any of the others I’ve suspected of being part of this. I think he’s a bit of a loose cannon. I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up dead.”
“I hope he does,” I said darkly.
“No.” Jennifer waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “That’s not what we want. We need them alive so I can continue to investigate them. I only have strong suspicions about three. I was intending on heading to London to follow Wilson tomorrow.”
“You’re leaving?” Sethi raised his shoulders in a deep sigh.
Bowing her head, Jennifer turned to him. “I’m sorry,” she mouthed.
“Always, I return home and off she goes,” he said to Gray and me, giving a sad shrug. His eyes showed a quiet worry.
“I know a couple of names,” said Gray, laying out the rest of the photocopies on the table. “I found these images online and I found out who at least two of them are.”
Jennifer’s forehead puckered as she read Gray’s notes and viewed photocopies. “How did you manage to dig these up?”
“I know a few different ways of pulling out old information from the net,” said Gray. “I think these were taken by someone spying on the group. They were fuzzy as hell. I cleaned them up and made them sharp.”
Jennifer’s eyes were suddenly rimmed with tears. “This screen shot of the text under this photo here. It says For no no boo.”
“Yeah.” Gray studied her changed expression. “Does that mean something to you?”
She nodded. “That’s what I used to call Noah when I was very small. I’d heard someone call him by his full name—Noah Bloom—and I began calling him no no boo.” She took a full breath. “My parents took these photos . . .”
I swallowed, saddened by the wistful gaze on Jennifer’s face. Sethi pressed his face to Jennifer’s shoulder in mute comfort.
She raised her eyes to Gray, wiping away the wetness from her cheeks. “You did a great job. My parents must have been trying to keep a record of what they’d found out. But these photos might just be what prompted the Saviours to kill them.”
“Do you recognise any of the names and faces?” said Gray, his tone intent but gentle.
“Yes,” she said. “Both of these people are dead. I thought they were victims of the Saviours. Now I know better. The Saviours are quick to kill their own if there’s any chance of being exposed—these two must have posed a risk.”
Gray sat heavily on a seat, his eyes clouding with disappointment.
Sethi kissed Jennifer’s temple and then took a close look at the photocopies himself. Suddenly, he slammed a hand down on the table. “Gamóto!”
“What did he say?” I whispered to Jennifer.
“He said fuck, basically,” she told me, turning to frown at her boyfriend. “Seth, what is it?”
“This landscape behind the people,” Sethi said. “I know it. It’s Greek.”
Gray ran a finger across the hilly backdrop of the photocopy. “Where? Where is it?”
“I don’t know the name of it,” Sethi told us. “It’s not a place you go by any accident. It’s a tiny island. Nothing on it except for an old monastery and a silent order of monks. No one is allowed to enter. I went there just one time as a teenager, with my father. We were looking for my uncle and his fishing boat. We found my uncle later in another location. But the island, I cannot forget it.”
Jennifer’s voice was tight and raw when she spoke. “You’re certain?”
Sethi nodded, his full lips firm. “I have never been so much certain. This rocky mountain peak that is shaped like a fist? Look, it has an old chapel on top. The chapel was crumbling when I saw it, and it doesn’t look any different here. I’m sure I could find it again.”
“And look at the date of the meeting,” said Jennifer in a hushed tone. “It’s this week—the week the Saviours always seem to gather. This has to be the place where they take their victims to.”
“But there’s a monastery there, monks . . .” Sethi’s tone was doubtful.
“It’s no monastery,” said Jennifer. “And these are not monks.”
Sethi and Jennifer stared at each other for a moment.
“This is it, then.” Her tone was quiet and understated. So . . . English. But the weight of what she’d meant was evident in her eyes.
A silent message passed between Gray and me. Whatever happened next, we were going to see this to the end.
59. EVIE
I HADN’T GIVEN THE CELLAR ANY consideration before nor had I ventured down this way. But then, I wasn’t an alcoholic. That wasn’t the cross I bore. I wondered how many of the alcoholics had noted the location of the wine cellar on the map and had wandered down here, hopeful they could grab a bottle without anyone noticing. No wonder the monks kept it securely locked.
I stood at the chained gate with Richard, Cormack, Louelle, Hop and Yolanda.
Cormack winked at us and then turned to apply the bolt cutters to the chain. He grunted with the effort.
The chain fell away.
The cutters in hand, he pushed the gate open. “Time to party.”
“Better have some quality wine down there.” Richard pinched Cormack’s cheek and stepped past him. “Age before beauty.”
Cormack snorted in reply.
We filed down the winding stairway after Richard.
The smell hit us about halfway.
I couldn’t guess what it was, but if this was the smell of fermenting alcohol, I wouldn’t touch a drop of it.
Richard stopped short, craning his head back at us and covering his lower face with his sleeve. “Jeez, what the hell? Smells rank.”
“Oh man.” Cormack spat on the stair. “You’re not wrong. This can’t be the damned wine cellar. Maybe it was once, but not anymore.”
Odours of rot and sickly things reached me, and I had to stop myself from vomiting on Yolanda’s back. “Let’s get out of here.”
Yolanda nodded. “This is foul.”
“Just wait,” said Richard. “I want to see what the good monks are keeping down here. Dead animals? Nothing shocks me. You don’t live in a drain for two years without seeing it all. I’ll go down there and take one for the team.”
“Dammit,” said Cormack. “I’m coming, too. If there’s one decent bottle of red down there, you’ll grab it and go drink it by yourself. After you, m’lady.”
Keeping his arm across his face, Richard continued on, going faster now, as if he just wanted to get it over with, until he disappeared from view.
A sudden choking sound punctuated the air—Richard’s voice.
“That bad, huh?” joked Cormack, running around the spiral staircase.
I looked back at Louelle and Hop as we followed behind the others.
The wide floor of the cellar came into view.
A scream rose inside my chest, but no sound came.
A scene that shocked every one of my senses.
A long, medieval-looking half wall spanned across the cavern directly ahead. People were slumped against the walls, chained. Dead or unconscious, I couldn’t tell.
Blood in their hair. On their faces. On their clothing.
Blood on the walls.
The people—they were us.
Us.
The challengers.
Kara, Mei, Thomas. Even Ruth . . .
The stench of blood and decay so thick it was suffocating.
A table held an array of knives, swords and other implements I couldn’t name.
Beyond the wall, an enormous door was open a sliver. I glimpsed people—bodies—hanging up high against a stone wall.
My chest wall stiffened against my gasping breaths.
With a roar, Cormack burst past Richard. “Kara! Kara!”
She was curled up in a corner of a cell
, her face against the stonework, blood spattered on one side of her clothing.
“Fuck this.” Richard knocked hard into Yolanda and me as he rushed back up the stairs and away.
I twisted my head around. Richard was gone. Louelle and Hop remained behind me, their eyes huge and unblinking.
Fear shot down my spine.
The chance to get out of here was now.
Richard had run. We could all run.
There were killers here in the monastery. How many? How many were there? And who were they?
Cormack cut the chains from Kara’s wrists.
She woke groggily.
Yolanda stood numbly, making a keening sound in her throat.
Louelle ran alongside me, her hand suddenly clutching mine. “We get who we can and then we go tell the mentors.” She paused for a second, her voice grown deeper. “Kill anyone who comes at us.”
I stared at her—nodding, but barely.
I couldn’t feel my legs beneath me as I ran with Louelle.
Cormack pulled the broken chains away from Kara’s wrists and ankles. Next to Kara, Ruth was chained and doubled over. I tried to rouse her, but she was either deeply asleep or unconscious.
I crouched down in front of Kara. “Are they down here—the people who did this to you?”
Kara turned her face to me, her eyes glazed and distant. “They’re everywhere.”
My fingernails dug into my flesh. “What do you mean, they’re everywhere?”
“You will see.” She let her face rest across the bloodied wall again.
“What about the others?” I persisted. “Where are they?”
“Floating . . .” Her voice limped out in whispers, her face still against the wall.
I wasn’t going to find out anything from Kara. My breath caught as I exchanged glances with Cormack. “What if the mentors are all dead?”
He swallowed, his cheeks drawing in and hollowing. “It’s war, then.”
Jumping up, I ran to the table and snatched up two large knives.
I had a better view from here inside the second room. Were the killers in there right now?
I caught sight of a pale, red-haired girl, strung up on the wall, in between two men that were hanging just like her.
Poppy.
She’d never left the island.
Blood rushed through my head and limbs.
With wooden legs I stepped to the door of the second room and peered through the gap in the door.
The room was hexagonal. Twelve people were strung up on the walls, two to each wall. Some of them missing one or more limbs. Dead, all of them. Including Poppy. Metronomes ticked away on twelve steps far below them, like a funeral march. The people must have been asked to walk onto the steps before they were hoisted up on the ropes.
My entire body grew cold.
The monastery hadn’t suddenly been invaded by a band of murderers. The entire cellar was set up for murder.
God, the monks.
It was the monks.
My mind screamed at me to leave. Escape.
But I couldn’t leave without checking, without being certain everyone here was dead.
I pushed the door all the way open and stepped inside.
Duncan half raised his slumped head to me, his eyes dulled. He was still alive. Somehow. Five knives were pierced through his body and into the wall behind.
“Duncan . . .” I could barely speak his name.
“This isn’t a good place, I have to warn you,” he rasped.
I fumbled with the hoist, already knowing it was useless. No one could save him. “We’ll get you down.”
“All told, it might be best if you kill me.” His voice chillingly matter-of-fact.
“No . . .”
“I was the safety officer at my work. If you remove the knives, I’ll bleed out.”
“I’ll get help. I’ll get help, Duncan.” But I’d vacated my words before I’d finished saying them.
He stared like he was no longer seeing me. “Tell my wife I did love her.” His head slumped again, chin hitting his chest.
I whirled around, checking the others in turn. All had been tortured to the point of death. Except for Poppy. Maybe. Maybe. She had cuts all over her body, but none seemed deep enough to kill her. But I couldn’t tell what else they might have done to her.
With a cry, I ran to her and used the hoist to lower her to the floor.
Please wake. Please wake.
Don’t be dead.
I knelt down to her crumpled figure. “Poppy, please . . .”
Her eyelids fluttered below a dark bruise on her forehead.
There. She was alive.
Working quickly, I sawed at the ropes around her wrists. I went too fast, making a small, shallow cut on her skin.
“Oh, hell. I’m sorry. So sorry.” Carefully, I pulled the ropes away from her rope-burned wrists.
Her eyes sprang open.
“I didn’t mean to cut you. I—”
“Evie. Evie, Evie, Evie . . .” She kept whispering my name as if nothing made sense, not even the fact that I was here in front of her.
“She’s in shock,” came a voice behind me. I turned to see Richard.
He bent to scoop Poppy in his arms. He met my eyes as he rose, shifting Poppy’s weight so that she settled against his chest. He looked as terrified as I felt.
I nodded, both shocked to see him and unsurprised.
Yolanda and Hop ran around the room, desperately checking all the others.
“They’re all dead. All of them,” breathed Yolanda.
Louelle stood at the doorway, sweat glistening on her face and chest. “We get out of here now. Or we don’t.”
A straggly, unsteady group of people stood behind her, their faces numbed with terror—the people that had been freed from the cells. Kara was among them, her shoulders caved inward and head down.
“Only seven?” I asked Louelle.
Louelle expelled a quick, sharp breath. “We can’t wake the others. They’re unconscious. We have to leave them.”
Richard headed out with Poppy. I rushed behind him, shooting a glance back at Duncan. It was already too late for him.
“There’s another way out!” Yolanda gestured frantically past the cells.
In the dim light, I saw what she was pointing at. A door with a small glass section.
We charged towards it.
Cormack got there first, pulling Kara along with him. Kara shook her head, holding onto Cormack’s arm and stopping him from touching the door. “There’s an alarm. Do you see it? And how would we get through those locks? There’s no use. They’ll be back here soon. There’s no way out.”
Richard found a flashlight on a shelf nearby and shone its light onto the locks. There were two solid bolts securing the door—too large to cut through. I could see nothing but darkness through the glass panel, nothing to tell me what was on the other side.
Most of the people we’d released had already turned away and fled, rushing for the stairs.
Louelle steadied a disoriented Thomas as he fell against the wall, his eyes dazed. “C’mon, kid, you can make it,” she told him. “We can’t go this way. We’re going out up the stairs. Put your arm around my shoulder.”
Hop stepped across to support Thomas’s other arm.
How are we all going to get out?
Don’t think now.
Just run.
60. CONSTANCE
SETHI AND JENNIFER BEGAN MAKING PLANS, leaving Gray and me to our own devices. I grew increasingly nervous.
Wasn’t it time to bring in the police? We had a location now. And some names.
But Jennifer had insisted that going to the police with this would do nothing except to get us all killed. She was certain that there were members of the Saviours among high-level police, only she didn’t know who. In desperation, I’d suggested contacting the media. She’d levelled her gaze at me and asked me what I thought would happen if we did that. With a growing terror
inside, I’d understood. Before such a thing even went to air, the Saviours would destroy all evidence, including their victims. Victims that included Kara and Evie. And then the Saviours would simply start up again, somewhere else.
I watched as Jennifer and Sethi packed a bewildering assortment of gadgets, speaking to each other in quick, rushed voices about ammunition, guns, cameras, signal interference, infrared devices and counter-surveillance.
They tried to shut Gray and me out of the discussion, but Gray was having none of it. He was adamant that he was going along on the trip. I decided that I would go, too. For all I knew, this might be the last time I would see Kara.
Jennifer and Sethi battled our assertions, telling us it was too dangerous and that we weren’t trained for this. But we won, in the end, partly I think because they knew that if we were with them, we couldn’t panic and run to the police.
Sethi went to get his boat ready—Gray going to help him. Jennifer excused herself and returned to the house.
Jennifer had instructed Gray and I not to contact anyone—not family members and not even Rico and Petrina. I hadn’t spoken to James since I was in Athens. No one was to be contacted until Jennifer and Sethi had been to the island and returned with evidence. All phones and tablets were to be kept switched off.
I was beginning to suspect that Jennifer had lived too long all alone. Except for Sethi, she had no one. She had no trust for anyone. But this was too big for Jennifer and Sethi to tackle by themselves.
Waves of rage, fear and frustration passed through me.
What if the four of us travelled to the Saviours’ island but then never returned? The knowledge of where the island was would die with us.
The photocopies of the Yeqon’s Saviours photographs were still lying on the table outside. I snapped a couple of quick pictures of the hill and the chapel with my phone and then headed away for a walk on the cliff edge. My heart nearly jumped through my chest as I sent the pictures through to Petrina, asking if she knew where it was. I didn’t tell her where the image had come from. If she and Rico had noticed it when they’d viewed the photocopies before, they hadn’t said anything.
I kept walking, my muscles forming knots. I could be jeopardising everything. But Jennifer didn’t own the search for the Saviours, even if she had been looking for most of her life. Gray and I were searching, too.
