SANDSTORM sf-1

by James Rollins

  Leopards.

  As silent as the night, the two cats closed in on him.

  8:18 P.M.

  SHOW MEon the map,” Cassandra said.

  The curator knelt on the floor of the tomb. She had spread out the same map as before. A straight blue line led from the first tomb on the coast to this one in the mountains. Now a second line, this one in red, branched away, heading northeast, crossing out of the mountains and into a great blank expanse of the desert, the Rub‘ al-Khali, the vast Empty Quarter of Arabia.

  Safia shook her head, running a finger along the line out into the sands. “It makes no sense. It could be anywhere.”

  Cassandra stared down at the map for several breaths. They were looking for a lost city in the desert. It had to be somewhere along that line, but where? The line crossed through the center of the vast expanse. It could be anywhere.

  “We’re still missing something,” Safia said, leaning back on her heels. She rubbed her temples.

  Kane’s radio buzzed, interrupting them. He spoke into his throat mike. “How many?” A long pause. “Okay, just keep a bloody close eye on them. Keep them away. Let me know if anything changes.”

  Cassandra eyed him as he finished.

  He shrugged. “Those sand rats we saw on the side of the road have returned. They’re setting up camp where we spotted them earlier.”

  Cassandra noted the concern in Safia’s face. The woman feared for her countrymen’s safety. Good. “Order your men to shoot anyone who gets close.”

  Safia tensed at her words.

  Cassandra pointed to the map. “The sooner we solve this mystery, the sooner we’re out of here.” That should light a fire under the curator.

  Safia stared sullenly at the map. “There must be some distance marker built into the artifact. Something we missed. A way to determine how far down this red line we must travel.”

  Safia closed her eyes, rocking a bit. Then she suddenly stopped.

  “What?” Cassandra asked.

  “The spear,” she said, glancing to the door. “I noticed striations along its shaft, marks scored into it. I thought them merely decoration. But back in the ancient past, measurements were often recorded as notches on a stick.”

  “So you think the number of marks could signify a distance?”

  Safia nodded and began to stand. “I have to count them.”

  Cassandra distrusted the woman. It would be easy to lie and lead them astray. She needed accuracy. “Kane, go out and count the number of marks.”

  He grimaced but obeyed, slapping on his sodden ball cap.

  After he left, Cassandra crouched by the map. “This has to be the final location. First the coast, then the mountain, now the desert.”

  Safia shrugged. “You’re probably right. The number three is significant to ancient faiths. Whether it’s the trinity of the Christian God-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit-or the ancient celestial trinity: the moon, the sun, and the morning star.”

  Kane appeared in the doorway, shaking rain from his cap. “Sixty-nine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He scowled at her. “Yes, I’m bloody damned sure.”

  “Sixty-nine,” Safia said. “That has to be right.”

  “Why?” Cassandra asked, turning her attention back to the curator as she bent over the map.

  “Six and nine,” Safia explained to the map. “Multiples of three. Just like we were talking about. Sequential, too. A very magical number.”

  “And here I always thought ‘sixty-nine’ meant something else,” Kane said.

  Seemingly deaf to the man, Safia continued to work, measuring with a protractor and tapping a calculator. Cassandra watched over her.

  “This is sixty-nine miles along the red line.” Safia circled the spot. “It ends up here in the desert.”

  Cassandra knelt down, took the protractor, and rechecked her measurements. She stared at the red circle, noting the longitude and latitude in her head. “So this may be the location of the lost city?”

  Safia nodded. She continued to stare at the map. “As best I can tell.”

  Cassandra’s brow crinkled, sensing the woman was keeping something from her. She could almost see the woman calculating something in her head.

  She grabbed Safia’s wrist. “What are you holding back-”

  A shot rang out nearby, clipping away any further words.

  It could be a misfire. It could be one of the bedouin shooting off his rifle. But Cassandra knew better. She swung around. “Painter…”

  8:32 P.M.

  PAINTER’S FIRSTshot went wild as he fell backward out the mosque’s doorway and onto the porch. A corner of a wall blasted away in a shower of plaster. Inside, the leopards parted, vanishing into the shadows of the mosque.

  Painter flung himself to the side, sheltering behind the half wall of the porch. Stupid. He shouldn’t have shot. He had reacted out of instinct, self-preservation. That wasn’t like him. But some terror beyond the leopards had gripped him, as if something had jangled the deepest root of his brain.

  And now he had given away the element of surprise.

  “Painter!” The shout came from the direction of the tomb.

  It was Cassandra.

  Painter dared not move. Leopards prowled on the inside, Cassandra on the outside. The lady or the tiger? In this case, both meant death.

  “I know you came for the woman!” Cassandra shouted into the rain. A rumble of thunder punctuated her words.

  Painter remained quiet. Cassandra couldn’t know for sure in which direction his gunshot had come from. Sound traveled oddly among these mountainous hills. He imagined her hiding in the tomb, calling out from the doorway. She dared not move into the open. She knew he was armed, but she didn’t know where he was.

  How could he use that to his advantage?

  “If you don’t show yourself-arms up, hands empty-in the next ten seconds, I’m going to shoot the prisoner.”

  He had to think quickly. To reveal himself now would only mean his death, along with Safia’s.

  “I knew you’d come, Crowe! Did you really think that I’d believe you were heading to the border of Yemen?”

  Painter flinched. He had sent out the e-mail only hours ago, planted with false information, delivered through a secure server to his boss. It had been a test balloon. As he feared, word had reached Cassandra intact. A sense of despair settled over him. That could only mean one thing. The betrayal of Sigma started at the very top.

  Sean McKnight…his own boss…

  Was that why Sean had paired him with Cassandra to begin with?

  It seemed impossible.

  Painter closed his eyes and took a deep breath, sensing his isolation.

  He was now alone out here, cut off. He had no one to contact, no one to trust. Oddly, this thought only helped energize him. He felt a giddy sense of freedom. He had to rely on himself and his immediate resources.

  That would have to be enough.

  Painter reached into his ditty bag and palmed the radio transmitter.

  Thunder growled, throatier, guttural. Rain fell harder.

  “Five seconds, Crowe.”

  All the time in the world…

  He stabbed the transmitter’s button and rolled toward the stairs.

  8:34 P.M.

  FROM SEVENTYyards away, Omaha jolted as the twin explosions rocketed the two SUVs into the air, as bright as lightning strikes. The dark night went brilliant. The concussion squeezed his ears, thundered in his rib cage.

  It was Painter’s signal. He had secured Safia.

  A moment ago, Omaha had heard a single gunshot, terrifying him. Now flames and debris rained down across the parking lot. Men lay sprawled in the dirt. Two were on fire, bathed in burning gasoline.

  It was time to move.

  “Now!” Omaha shouted, but his yell sounded tinny in his own ears.

  Still, rifle fire spat out of the forest to either side of Omaha. Additionally, a few flashes of muzzle fire spa
rked from a high shoulder that overlooked the parking lot, coming from a pair of Bait Kathir snipers.

  Up at the tomb, two guards had been picking themselves off the ground. They suddenly jerked, bodies thrown backward. Shot.

  Other guards sought cover, reacting with well-honed skill. These were no amateurs. They retreated over the compound walls, seeking fast cover.

  Omaha lifted his binoculars.

  Atop the hill’s plateau, the two burning SUVs lit the parking lot. The third vehicle had been shoved a few feet by the concussion. Pools of flaming gasoline dotted the dirt and hood, steaming in the rain. Painter was supposed to use the vehicle as an escape vehicle. He should’ve been there by now.

  Where was he? What was he waiting for?

  An ululating cry rose to Omaha’s right. Bells jangled. A dozen camels scattered uphill. Amid them ran more of the Bait Kathir. Cover fire rained from out of the tree line.

  A few shots now answered. A camel bellowed, dropping to one knee, skidding in the dirt. An explosion ripped into the hillside off to Omaha’s left. A flash of fire and torn tree limbs, smoking leaves, and dirt flumed upward.

  A grenade.

  And then a new sound.

  It came from the deep gorge to the right.

  Shit…

  Five small helicopters rose into view, as swift as gnats and as tiny. One-man vehicles. Just blades, engine, and pilot. They looked like flying sleds. Spotlights swept the grounds, peppering the area with automatic gunfire.

  Camels and men fled in all directions.

  Omaha clenched a fist. The bitch had been expecting them. She’d had a backup force lying in wait, an ambush. How had she known?

  Coral and Barak appeared at Omaha’s elbow. “Painter’s going to need help,” Coral hissed. “He can’t reach the escape vehicle now. It’s too exposed.”

  Omaha glanced up to the lot, now a bloodbath of bodies and camels. From the forest, shots fired up at the helicopters, driving them higher. But they continued a zigzagging pattern over the compound, guarding it tightly.

  The entire plan had fallen to shit.

  But Safia was up there. Omaha was not leaving her again.

  Coral freed her pistol. “I’m going in.”

  Omaha grabbed her arm. Her muscles were cords of steel. He held tight, brooking no argument. “This time, we’re all going in.”

  8:35 P.M.

  KARA STAREDdown at the Kalashnikov rifle on her lap. Fingers twitching uncontrollably on the stock, she found it hard to concentrate. Her eyes felt too large for her head, threatening a migraine, while nausea lapped at her belly.

  She dreamed of a little orange pill.

  To her side, Clay fought to get the engine started. He cranked it again, but it failed to turn over. Danny sat in the backseat with the lone pistol.

  The explosion had lit up the northern hills like a rising sun. It was Painter’s signal. Across the intervening two valleys, echoing spatters of gunfire sounded like fireworks.

  “Piece of shit!” Clay swore, and struck his hand on the steering wheel.

  “You’ve flooded it,” Danny said sourly from the back.

  Kara stared out the passenger window. A ruddy glow persisted to the north. It had started. If all went well, the others would be racing downhill in one of the kidnappers’ SUVs. The remainder of the party would scatter into the hills. The Bait Kathir knew many paths through the forested mountains.

  But something felt wrong.

  Maybe it was just the edgy frazzle in Kara’s head. It grew more acute with each breath. Pain lanced behind her eyes. Even the light of the dashboard stabbed painfully bright.

  “You’re going to wear the battery down,” Danny warned as Clay engaged the engine again. “Let it rest. Five minutes at least.”

  A buzzing filled Kara’s skull, as if her body were an antenna, tuning in on static. She had to move. She could no longer sit still. She pulled open the latch and half fell out the door, bobbling her rifle.

  “What are you doing?” Clay called to her, frightened.

  She didn’t answer. She stepped into the road. The van had been pulled under the branches of a tamarind tree. She crossed out into the open and wandered a short distance up the road, out of sight of the van.

  Gunfire continued to echo.

  Kara ignored it, her attention focused closer at hand.

  An old woman stood in the roadway, facing Kara, as if waiting for her. She was dressed in a long desert cloak, her face hidden behind a black veil. In her bony fingers, she carried a staff of gnarled wood, worn smooth and shiny.

  Kara’s head throbbed. Then the static in her head finally tuned to a proper station. Pain and nausea drained from her. She felt momentarily weightless, unburdened.

  The woman merely stared.

  Numbness filled the empty spaces inside her. She didn’t fight it. The rifle dropped from Kara’s limp fingers.

  “She will need you,” the woman finally said, turning away.

  Kara followed after the stranger, moving as if in a dream.

  Back by the tamarind tree, she heard the van’s engine crank and fail.

  Kara continued walking, leaving the road behind and heading down into the forested valley. Kara did not resist, even if she had been able to.

  She knew who needed her.

  8:36 P.M.

  SAFIA HADbeen forced to her knees, hands on top of her head. Cassandra crouched behind her, a pistol pressed at the base of her skull, another pointed toward the entrance. They both faced the doorway, poised tensely on the far side of the chamber. The grave mound stood between them and the exit.

  With the explosion, Cassandra had extinguished the lights and sent Kane out a back window. To circle around. To hunt down Painter.

  Safia clenched her fingers together. Could it be true? Could Painter still be alive, be somewhere out there? If that was so, had the others survived? Tears welled. No matter what, she was not alone. Painter had to be out there.

  Gunfire still rattled from beyond the compound.

  Fires cast the night in crimson and shadow.

  She heard the beat of helicopters, spatters of automatic fire.

  “Just let us go,” Safia pleaded. “You have Ubar’s location.”

  Cassandra remained silent in the dark, her full attention on the door and windows. Safia didn’t know if she had even heard her plea.

  From beyond the door, a shuffling sound reached them.

  Someone was coming. Painter or Kane?

  Across the doorway, a large shadow passed, lit momentarily by the lone flashlight still out in the courtyard.

  A camel.

  It was a surreal sight as it sauntered past, soaked by the rain. In its wake, a woman stood framed in the doorway, naked. She seemed to shimmer in the crimson glow of the nearby fires.

  “You!” Cassandra gasped.

  In one hand, the stranger carried the silver case containing the iron heart. It had been resting just outside the door.

  “No you don’t, bitch!” Cassandra fired her pistol, two rounds, deafeningly close to Safia’s left ear.

  Crying out from the painful sound of the blast, Safia fell forward onto one of the prayer rugs. She rolled a step away, toward the grave mound.

  Cassandra followed, still firing at the door.

  Safia craned up, her head ringing. The doorway was empty again. She glanced sidelong to Cassandra, who’d assumed a shooter’s stance, both pistols pointed toward the open door.

  Safia saw her chance. She grabbed the edge of the prayer rug, which she now shared with Cassandra. In a swift motion, she lunged up, dragging the rug with her.

  Caught by surprise, Cassandra toppled, her feet going out from under her.

  A pistol fired.

  Plaster shattered from the ceiling.

  As Cassandra fell backward, Safia dove over the grave mound and rolled toward the door. At the entrance, she leaped headlong over the threshold.

  Another blast.

  In midair, Safia felt a kick in he
r shoulder, shoving her around. She hit the ground and skidded in the mud. Her shoulder burned. Shot. Panicked, reacting on pure instinct, she rolled to the side, away from the doorway.

  Rain washed over her.

  She scrambled around the corner, pushing through a hedgerow to enter the narrow alley between the tomb and the ruins of the prayer room.

  As she reached cover, a hand from behind reached out of the darkness and clamped over her mouth hard, bruising her lips.

  8:39 P.M.

  PAINTER HELDtight to Safia, clinging to her. “Stay quiet,” he whispered in her ear, leaning against the wall of the ruins.

  She quaked in his grip.

  He had been hiding here for the past few minutes, watching the courtyard, attempting to ascertain some way to draw Cassandra out. But his ex-partner seemed entrenched, patient, letting her team do the work for her while she guarded the prize. Spotlights from the hovering helicopters crisscrossed the yard, keeping him pinned down. Again Cassandra had outwitted him, hiding an aerial force, probably sent here in advance.

  All seemed hopeless.

  Then a moment ago, he had watched a camel stroll by through the rain, seemingly unconcerned by the gunfire, moving with steady determination to pass his hiding place and disappear in front of the tomb. Next, a spatter of shots and Safia came tumbling out.

  “We have to reach the back wall of the complex,” he whispered, motioning down the alleyway. There was too much gunfire coming from out front. They’d have to take their chances on the steep slopes out back, try to reach cover. He released his grip on her, but she still clung to him.

  “Keep behind me,” he urged.

  Twisting around, Painter led the way in a low crouch, heading back toward the rear of the complex. The shadows lay thicker there. He kept a keen watch through his night-vision glasses, wary and tense. Pistol pointed forward. Nothing moved. The world was defined in shades of green. If they could reach the far wall that encircled the complex…