The Bone Chamber

35

Sydney kept an eye on the two men, wondering if she’d truly lost her mind, thinking she could spring di Sangro’s trap. What if it was an elaborate hoax, like the curse in the pyramids to ward off grave robbers? Or what if the sand was merely there to keep some deadly plague hidden and out of sight?

Griffin fired off two rounds. “This plan of yours…I’m not sure we have enough ammo to break these urns and try to keep them at bay.”

“I’ve already thought of that.” By her calculations, she had maybe three shots left. “Just watch for my cue, and get ready to cover me.”

He crouched beside the urn. Sydney nodded once, then popped up, shouting as she fired two rounds. One of the men cried out, hit. She ducked back. Hope he’s dead, she thought, then glanced over toward Griffin. He was halfway across the cavern, crouching behind one of the manmade stalagmites. She turned back to her targets; both had moved closer. Great. The man she’d hit wasn’t dead, just grazed on his shoulder. One shot left. Griffin nodded. She popped up, took her last shot, prayed Griffin made it, then dropped flat to the ground. She scooted past the skeleton, then yanked on the tube beside it. It was wedged tight. She pulled harder. The moment she did, she heard something move. Shift. Sand slid to the floor from the rocky shelf behind the body. No time to wonder. A shot hit the urn above her head. The report echoed off the walls.

This was it. Keeping well to one side, and out of sight, she held the tube up over the urn that had been cracked, yelling, “I give up. Don’t shoot!”

A sharp report echoed across the cavern. The urn broke apart. Sand poured forth from behind it, and she yelled, “Now!”

Griffin fired off his last rounds. Tube in hand, Sydney scrambled toward the north tunnel.

Suddenly a low rumbling noise seemed to shake the very stone itself. The floor beneath them vibrated. Dust rained down, into her eyes, rattled against her helmet like dried rice. She hesitated.

“Move,” Griffin yelled.

She sprinted toward Griffin and the tunnel. He grabbed the tube, lifted her in. He climbed in after her, and she caught sight of the two men, no longer watching them. Both looked up at the ceiling.

“Forget them,” he said.

She scurried forward. The space, though wide, was barely high enough to crawl on hands and knees, and at some points, not even that high. After twenty or so feet they rounded a corner, and the path began a sharp incline. Sydney scurried up, her eyes watering against the dust. Bits of tufo stung her face, her back. Suddenly the floor rippled beneath her, the air tasting of crushed rock. She started sliding down. Griffin grabbed her by the shirt, braced himself. A pressure in her ears pushed then released, as though the air was sucked out of the tunnels. A second later, she looked down, the dim light from her helmet revealing the blocked passageway below. The entrance was gone. No space at all. The rumbling continued as rock below them seemed to settle. There was no way back.

Only up.

Almost straight up.

“How the hell-”

“Like Santa in a chimney,” Griffin said.

Francesca and Xavier fled around the corner, then down one of countless narrow streets, this time into the midst of the open-air market, crowded with locals and tourists alike, all talking about the minor earthquake they’d felt. The two ducked behind a cart filled with ice and fresh fish, then dared a peek around the edge to see if they were still being followed.

“You see them?” Francesca asked.

Xavier nodded, trying to catch his breath. “Yeah. Don’t think they saw where we went, but give it a minute or two and they’ll trip right over us.”

“We really need to get out of this. Preferably in one piece.” And without anyone else around them getting hurt, she wanted to add. She was tired, too tired to run. Playing cat and mouse was a lot harder than she thought, and any momentary admiration and envy at seeing Sydney Fitzpatrick in action made her truly appreciate her own choice of going into academia. She ignored the thought that it was that very pursuit for historical significance that had started this mess, and she leaned against the cart, tried to catch her breath. That was when she saw the catwalk between the buildings, barely visible behind the awning that covered the pushcarts of fruits and vegetables spread out before it. The vendor called out in Nepalese that he had fresh produce for sale. “You have any idea where that leads?” she asked, pointing to the catwalk.

Xavier looked over. “Back to the basilica. Why?”

“I think we need to slip through there.”

The two men chasing Francesca and Xavier stopped in the middle of the market square. “They can’t have gone far,” the first said.

“Over there. That’s where I saw them last. By the fish.”

“If we find them, I vote we finish them here, now.”

“Idiot. There are too many witnesses. We do it right. Stick our gun in their ribs, frighten them, get them to tell us where their friends are. Then we take the map and kill them. Adami has no idea we are here, and Mr. Westgate doesn’t want to lose the map to him.”

“What about the witnesses?”

He didn’t answer, apparently because the question needed no answering. There were to be no witnesses. Period. Francesca dared a look from where she hid. The man started toward the fish cart, then stopped just in front of it, looking around. “You see them?”

“No.”

“Fresh fruit!” cried the vendor across the street.

The man ignored him.

“Fresh fish!” called the vendor beside the two men.

They started to move away, but the first man stopped. “I am looking for my friends,” he asked the vendor. “A man and a woman. Americans.”

“The woman, red hair?”

“Yes.”

The vendor narrowed his gaze. “Your American friends, they almost knocked my cart over.”

“They are in trouble. My apologies. Which way did they go?”

“Through there. I heard them say something about the basilica,” he replied, pointing across the street toward the catwalk.”

“Grazie.”

He gave a shrug, then turned away, calling out, “Fresh fish! The freshest!”

“Hurry,” the first man said. “They may have a car parked at the basilica.”

“Fresh fish!”

Francesca’s breath caught. They ran right past her. She waited until their footfall faded down the catwalk before she emerged. She dug all the money she had from her pocket, then handed it over to the fish vendor the moment the two henchmen disappeared from sight at the other end of the catwalk. “Grazie, signore.”

The vendor smiled. “My pleasure, signorina. If you are smart, you and your friend will go to the end of the street, then turn south. My friend has a horse and cart for tourists. He can give you a ride to wherever it is you need to go. Tell him that Pietro sent you. He will help.”

They thanked him again, then raced down the street, where, as promised, his friend waited and gladly took them on at the mention of Pietro’s name. Within minutes they were seated in a covered carriage, the sound of the mare’s hooves clopping down the cobbled street at a brisk trot. Xavier offered the man some money, but he refused, saying he was going that way anyway, and their thanks was enough. Fifteen minutes later, he dropped them off a half block from the coffee shop where they were to meet Dumas.

Sydney watched as Griffin took the rope from his backpack, the one they’d used the first time, then looped it around her waist. That done, he shimmied up a few feet into the tunnel to show her it could be done, his back wedged against one wall of the tunnel, his feet against the other. She followed him up, thinking it was rough enough to allow some hand purchase, and wasn’t as hard as she first thought. Nor as easy, she realized. Especially after another shift of stone, as though the earth finally settled. She looked down. Nothing but blackness, an unsettling feeling, not having any idea how far they’d traveled. Or how far she’d fall if she slipped. The very thought made her dizzy.

“Don’t recommend that,” Griffin said.

“Now you tell me. How much farther?”

“Hard to say. Another ten feet?”

She could do ten feet.

After about fifteen, she figured he’d lied to her. Probably a good thing. She’d lost her right glove when she’d pulled it off during the firefight down in the cistern. And now her nails shredded against the rough surface, the rock dug into her fingertips. She was stretched out, one foot on each wall, her hands gripping the sides.

A low rumble pulsated along the tunnel walls.

“Griffin?”

“Just the earth settling. Don’t worry.”

But the rumbling didn’t stop. It grew louder, deeper, vibrated through the stones into her bones. She braced herself against the walls, tried to hold on. Rocks hurtled down, hit her helmet, her arms. The earth shuddered one last heave. Her bloody hand slipped, and she plunged down into the blackness, nothing beneath her feet.