The Templar Salvation

Chapter 44

Tess gave the cave-like interior a quick scan. The room had been hollowed out of the soft rock, the walls around her riddled with carved-out niches, some small, others big enough to sleep in. Its floor was littered with debris—a broken-up rattan chair, the faded sheets of an old Turkish newspaper, a few discarded water bottles and soda cans. It didn’t look like anyone had lived there in years.

She spotted some stairs that spiraled upward in a far corner and stepped toward them, hoping the way down was there too—and her feet stumbled against a wooden hatch that was sunken into the floor. She dropped to her knees and ran her hands across it, brushing the dust off its uneven surface. It was hinged on one side. At its opposide end, her fingers found an old piece of rope that was fashioned into a handle, embedded into the dirt floor around it.

She yanked the hatch open. A cloud of dust billowed up, prickling her eyes and throat. She coughed as she pointed her flashlight into the gaping hole. A very steep flight of steps, also carved out of the tufa, led downward.

A growing rustle from outside, the crush of footfalls drawing near, spurred her to move. With the flashlight clasped tightly in one hand, she clambered down the stairs as fast as she could.

ZAHED CAREENED TO A STOP outside the cone house, by the blood-soaked body of the Byzantinist.

There was no one around, but he still didn’t like the idea of leaving him lying there, signposting what had happened. He stuffed his gun in his pants and dragged Abdulkerim inside, dumping him just inside the doorway, out of view from anyone walking by.

He saw the open hatch and, in the far corner, the stairs leading up. He drew his gun and looked down through the opening in the floor. There was no sign of movement, no noise coming from there. He thought about it for a second, then crossed over to the stairs and climbed up a few steps, listening intently. He didn’t need to go any higher—he could see debris littering the landing. It didn’t look like it had been disturbed. His instincts had told him she’d gone through the hatch anyway.

He hurried back down and ducked into the black hole.

TESS WAS BREATHING HARD as she moved through the narrow tunnel.

The batteries in Abdulkerim’s flashlight were clearly on their last legs, and the light it was giving off was weakening noticeably. She knew it wouldn’t last long, and did her best to save batteries by not keeping it on all the time. She would flick it on and off intermittently, using it to get her bearings before advancing to the next landmark in total darkness. Electric cabling ran along the walls, linking one light fixture to another. There hadn’t been any current running through the wiring for years, but it was still a useful trail to follow, and Tess did her best to keep one hand running along its thick, black rubber coating as it led her deeper and deeper into the subterranean maze.

By now, with more than a dozen caverns and tunnels behind her, her sense of direction was completely overwhelmed. She had no idea where she was. The “underground city” may not have been a city exactly, but it was still—literally—mind-boggling: a seemingly endless warren of chambers of all shapes and sizes connected to one another by low-ceilinged tunnels and narrow steps. There wasn’t a right angle or a sharp corner to be found. Instead, every edge was rounded, every wall and ceiling curved, and it all had the same numbing color, a chalky off-white tinged with the dirty brown wash of time.

And it was tight. Maddeningly, suffocatingly tight. Even the larger chambers that were used as communal spaces felt unnervingly claustrophobic. The tunnels and stairs were the worst. They were little wider than her shoulders, and she had to stay hunched to get through them. They were that way by design. Invading warriors, if they managed to get past the handful of strategically placed millstones that could be rolled out with the flick of a small stone to block access to the entire underground maze, would have to advance single-file after leaving their bulky shields behind. That made them easier to repel. In fact, the entire honeycomb was brilliantly designed as a refuge: There were huge storage spaces for food and animal feed, wineries, wells for water and air shafts for ventilation. Everything was planned defensively; even the chimneys of their fire pits branched out into many small outlets before they emerged aboveground, to spread out the smoke and help avoid detection.

As she advanced farther into the hollowed-out ground, Tess did her best to try to not think about the fact that the entire canyon above her had been condemned because of unstable ground and rock slides. Instead, she tried to remember that there was a saving grace to her being there: The bomb she was carrying around her waist was probably not a threat right now. Still, it wasn’t enough to calm her nerves, as her earlier fear was now being replaced by one that was even more terrifying: whether she’d ever find her way back out of that rocky labyrinth and see daylight again.

After going down some steps and banking right through a particularly narrow passage, she found herself in a larger, airier room that had three rough-hewn columns down its center. A stable, perhaps, or an underground church. It didn’t really matter. She paused to catch her breath and think. She guessed she was now on either the second or third level, and knew that there could be many more below her. She didn’t want to venture too far down—the place was a maze and she ran a real risk of not finding her way back. She couldn’t go back out yet, though. Not until she knew the Iranian and his cell phone were no longer a threat.

“Tess!”

The Iranian’s yell shook her to her roots as it echoed through the hollow caverns.

“I just want those books,” he bellowed. “Give them to me and I’ll leave you alone.”

She knew what he was doing. Goading her, prodding her to make a move, make a noise, answer back—anything that would reveal her position. Still, he felt dangerously close. So close, in fact, that she now heard scraping along the wall, coming her way.

ZAHED CREOT FORWARD, following the cabling, his trained senses alert for the smallest sign of life.

He figured Tess had to be following the cabling too. Her survival instinct would have told her to do so. Follow it down, and you can follow it back up. She had an advantage, though. The flashlight. He’d seen a faint glimmer of it, flicking on and off for the briefest moments, but it had been enough to draw him in like a homing beacon.

He thought of using his phone to light the way and tried it out. The screen didn’t give off much light, and in his situation, it was more of a hindrance than an advantage. It didn’t really show him much, but it would announce his presence to Tess. He decided not to use it for the time being. That would also save batteries, and he needed to be able to contact Steyl and other support when he needed it.

He felt himself emerging from a narrower passage into a larger space, and stopped and listened. He couldn’t see anything around him, but he sensed her close. He held his breath and froze, concentrating on locking in on her likely position.

A lopsided smile spread across his face as he tightened his grip on the handgun and angled it ahead of him.

Then he fired a single round.

THE DETONATION BOOMED THROUGH THE CAVERN as the round whizzed past Tess and crunched into the wall somewhere beyond her. It took her by complete surprise and she couldn’t help but shriek—and in that instant, she heard footsteps charging toward her.

Clutching the rucksack tight, she lunged away from the wall toward the center of the room, cursing at having given herself away like that, summoning her recall of the layout of the chamber and hoping she wasn’t about to slam into one of its columns. She felt the Iranian veering toward her, and her whole body tightened in anticipation of his tackle or, worse, another gunshot. Then a different outcome played itself out at hyper-fast forward in her mind’s eye, and she instantly adjusted her trajectory accordingly and sped up, hoping she’d gotten it right.

Her splayed fingers found one of the three square columns, and she rounded it and turned slightly, putting it between her and the rapidly approaching stalker—and just as she rounded it, she heard it, skin and bone slamming against stone along with an angry yell of pain.

Gotcha, you bastard.

She’d suckered him right into one of the columns, but there was no time to stick around and gloat. She had to get out of there. She veered back toward an opening she’d spotted in the opposite wall and spread her arms out protectively, looking for the edge of the wall. They found the corner of the rocky surface and she slowed right down and slunk into the passage, moving carefully while running her hand up the wall until it found the cabling. There was no question of using her flashlight anymore. She scuttled ahead, her feet feeling the ground ahead, wary of an unseen step—and then she heard it again.

Movement, more rash, more intense this time.

Angrier.

Chasing after her.

Only this time, it was accompanied by the angry, throaty roar of someone who’d been winded.

ZAHED BOUNCED OFF THE STONE OILLAR and went down like a rag doll. His extended arm had hit it first, which gave him a split second to tilt away and avoid a full-frontal hit.

Still, it hurt like hell. His chest, his shoulder, his hip, his knee, and his cheek—they’d all slammed into the solid rock under full acceleration. He felt a metallic taste in his mouth and wiped it clean with the back of his hand. It was wet with blood.

His mind quickly assessed the damage. Nothing seemed broken, but the heavy bruising would definitely slow him down and limit his agility for a while. He bunkered the pain and focused on the more immediate concern. The gun. He’d dropped it in the collision.

He stayed down and ran quick concentric sweeps of the ground around him. It didn’t take long for him to find it. Cursing himself for his mistake, he pushed himself back to his feet, his ears scanning for target acquisition.

He spat some more blood out and screamed her name in rage, and was back after her within seconds.

“TESS! WHERE ARE YOU, BITCH!”

The yell reverberated around her, propelling her forward like wind to a sail. She heard him entering the narrow passage just as she was reaching the chamber at its other end.

This time would be harder. She couldn’t use her flashlight, and she couldn’t use the cables either. She didn’t know what the room looked like—how big it was, its layout, what obstacles or pitfalls it presented. She was as vulnerable in it as he was. Worse, she was the quarry. She had to be quiet, she had to explore it without making a sound. All he had to do was follow the noise, and in the deathly quiet of the subterranean citadel, even the tiniest noise she made was getting amplified way out of proportion. She sounded as discreet as the percussion section of a marching band.

She pushed away from the wall and its cabling and prowled through the darkness blindly, her arms extended defensively like an insect’s antennae, groping the air, wary of any obstruction. She found the opposite wall, making the room out to be around fifteen feet wide or so. She ran her fingers up and down its smooth surface as she advanced farther, and then they found something else. A low-level niche in the wall, about four feet wide, starting just above ground level and going up to her waist.

She knew there were all kinds of rooms down there: wineries, kitchens, food storage chambers, all of which had cavities of various sizes cut into their walls and floors. Before she could think of what this one was, she heard him getting nearer and froze.

She couldn’t risk moving ahead, not with him that close. She didn’t have much of a choice. She bent down and climbed into the niche, pushing herself into it as far as she could. It was only about a foot and a half deep.

Then she waited.

She’d barely made it in when she heard the soft padding of his feet grow sharper. He’d just entered the room. Spiders scurried wildly through her belly as she shriveled up and pressed back against the wall.

She heard him scuttle along the opposite wall.

So far, so good. Keep going.

He stopped.

She stopped breathing.

He didn’t make a sound for what felt like forever. She imagined him there, a few feet away from her, listening intently, like a panther in the dark. She felt every pore on her body pucker up as she made herself as small as she could, her body rigid with tension, her lungs desperate to breathe freely, her mind taut in anticipation of some other jolt—a shout, a bullet, something designed to make her jump.

It didn’t take long to come.

“I know you’re here, Tess. I can hear you breathing.”

She felt her heart contract and freeze as she braced herself for his next move, repeating to herself over and over that she couldn’t afford to react. She concentrated intently on her hearing, using her ears as sonar.

She heard a faint scuff.

Then another.

He was moving.

Slowly.

Heading straight for her.