The fighting went on back in the corridor before the fork. Another gunshot boomed and the scuffling and cursing and grunting continued, but with the flashlight beams darting around, it was impossible to make out much detail. Shapes and shadows fought, and the copper stink of blood filled the air, along with the acrid odor of cordite from the guns.
Olivia grabbed Jada by the arms, unmindful of the gun in the younger woman’s hand.
“Do something,” she said, her pristine beauty tarnished by desperation. “If they kill Tyr and his men, we’re next!”
Jada shoved her with such force that Olivia slammed into the wall, skull thunking against stone.
“There’s no ‘we,’ Olivia,” Jada snapped. “You and me-there’s no we.”
Drake didn’t take the time to tell Jada that Olivia had a point, and he suspected she wouldn’t have listened if he had. But there was no doubt that they were in trouble. If Henriksen survived, he might stab them in the back at some point, but if the choice was that or death for him and his friends in the next ninety seconds or so, he’d take a knife in the back somewhere down the line.
“Sully,” Drake said.
“Yeah.”
They started past the dead man, bent low to keep from toppling backward, and climbed back toward the split in the corridor. Drake caught a glimpse of the man he’d thought of as Buzzcut staggering past the doorway ahead, the hilt of a blade jutting from his back. One of the hooded men followed, intent on finishing the job he’d begun.
“Hey!” Sully shouted.
The killer turned.
“This is for Luka,” Sully said, and shot the hooded man three times.
“Overkill, maybe?” Drake suggested. “We don’t know how many bullets we’re going to need.”
They reached the door, sliding their backs along the walls opposite each other, guns raised. Drake studied Sully’s face, wondering how many times the two of them had been stuck like this, trapped somewhere they might be imprisoned just for entering, with merciless killers between them and the exit. But he didn’t bother to count. Once was once too often.
“On three,” Drake said. “One. Two-”
Olivia screamed again, even more frantic than before.
Drake and Sully turned to see Olivia scrambling up the sheer stone, climbing over the dead man, eyes wide with terror. Jada had her back to them, her flashlight aimed farther down the severe drop-off of the tunnel. More hooded men were coming up from deeper within the labyrinth, scrabbling up the stone slope like spiders.
“Damn it!” Sully shouted.
Jada shot one of them, tried to turn and flee up the steep incline, but slipped and fell onto her side on the stone floor of the corridor. The hooded men swept toward her. In the glow of Sully’s flashlight, Drake made out four of them, not counting the one Jada had just shot. They had swarmed over their wounded comrade as if he weren’t there.
“I thought they followed us in, like Henriksen,” Drake said.
“They flanked us,” Sully muttered.
Drake had wondered before if the hooded men knew about this labyrinth, if they were as knowledgeable about its secrets and hidden chambers as they had been about the one in Egypt, and now he had his answer.
Olivia kept screaming, and Drake wished she would shut up. He took aim and was about to pull the trigger, but then Sully blocked his shot. Drake shouted at him to get out of the way, but with Jada in danger, Sully wasn’t going to be able to be reasoned with. Drake realized he didn’t want to risk trying to shoot the killers unless he was right up close.
With a roar that managed to be warning and battle cry and profanity all in one, Sully hurtled down the sheer slope with his gun and flashlight both held out in front of him. One of the hooded men reached Jada, grabbed her leg, and brandished the curved blade they all seemed to carry. Sully shot him in the head, but Drake knew the shot was pure luck. At that angle and speed, careening out of control, Sully’s next move was no longer his choice to make.
“Sully, no!” Drake shouted.
The words echoed off the walls as Sully lost his footing, moving too fast, yet managed to lunge at the three remaining killers, passing right over Jada. He crashed into them, knocking two of them backward, and they all fell sprawling and rolling down the tunnel into the darkness, Sully’s flashlight shattering and winking out.
The scuffling from that darkness chilled Drake’s blood.
“Son of a-” he began.
Jada cried out for her godfather. Drake slid and skidded down the tunnel toward her, stepping over the man he’d shot and calling out for Sully, hearing only the whisper of movement below. Jada stood, recovering her flashlight and shining it down into the dark, and they both saw the figures twisted around one another. The three hooded men struggled with Sully, one of them clamping a hand over his mouth. His eyes were wide and gleaming in the beam from Jada’s light, and Drake wanted to look away, sure that any second a curved blade would slice Sully’s throat.
“Down here!” Olivia shouted behind them. “There are more of them down here!”
“Drake!” a low voice called.
He didn’t turn. The voice belonged to Henriksen, and he put together what it meant. The man was wounded but alive, and if he and Olivia and others-given the footfalls Drake could hear-were starting down the sloped fork, it meant they had won back there at the split in the corridor.
“Let him go!” Drake roared at the hooded men.
They did not, but neither did they cut Sully’s throat. Instead, they dragged him deeper into the tunnel, scrambling back into the darkness.
“Crap!” Drake barked. It was just like Welch. They had lost the fight and were retreating, but they were taking Sully with them.
Drake spun as Henriksen came down the slope toward him. The wounded man had lost his gun but still held a flashlight.
“Give me that,” Drake demanded.
“He’s as good as dead,” Henriksen snapped.
“No,” Jada said. “They took him! They didn’t kill him!”
Drake snatched the light from Henriksen. “I’m going after him.”
He started down into the forgotten heart of the labyrinth, and when he sensed Jada behind him, heard her footsteps, and saw her flashlight beam merging with his to illuminate the darkness below, he didn’t argue. With her father dead, Sully was the closest thing either one of them had to a father. They would save him together or not at all.
16
Drake stood in total darkness, his forehead pressed against hot stone, trying to contain the urge to scream. He could hear the rustle and click of Jada going through her pack nearby, putting a fresh set of batteries into her flashlight. She spoke in a low voice, but he barely heard the words. Was she trying to comfort him or herself? He couldn’t be sure. Probably both.
How much time had passed since the hooded men had dragged Sully away? An hour and a half? Two?
At first it had felt as if Drake and Jada were giving chase, and he had believed they could catch up with the murderous bastards. He had reminded himself that if they’d wanted Sully dead, they could have killed him right there in the tunnel, and they hadn’t done it. But still the image of Sully struggling with the hooded men as they hauled him into the shadows haunted Drake. Would it be the last time he would see his friend and mentor alive? After a time, he forced himself not to think about it, focusing entirely on the pursuit.
But soon the chase gave way to something more closely resembling a search. They had followed the twists of the labyrinth, ignoring blind alleys thanks to the diamond markings that indicated the proper path. They stopped
