this was where Ram said he would take them before they left Rahab’s cellar. Deker had pointed him in the right direction by suggesting they find a section of the wall where a gate once existed but had since been walled up. Ram said he knew of just such a section.
Now the spire of Jericho’s giant stone tower gleamed like a minaret against the full moon as they crossed the fortress’s plaza. The iron door Ram was heading toward was on the opposite end of the plaza, in the middle of the north wall.
The central plaza of the fortress was dark, but Deker could make out the columns of the royal palace to his left and the colossal metallic temple of Molech glinting to his right. It was at least several stories tall, with two great bronze doors in its belly and a head in the shape of a bull.
Deker could almost feel Molech’s eyes follow him and Ram toward the inside gate of the north wall.
So far, Deker had yet to see the garrison headquarters and troop barracks, let alone the military supply dumps. Which was odd, considering the number of troops Ram claimed Hamas had under his command.
The guards on duty at the iron gate recognized Ram and let them in.
What Deker found inside was another world: a network of tunnels built inside the fortress walls, floor upon floor.
“Welcome to our barracks,” Ram said as they pushed their way through the crowded tunnels, past stepladders and rows of hammocks. Torches hung like chandeliers above to give as much shoulder room as possible.
This was how you hid ten thousand healthy, well-fed troops in a city of two thousand or so, Deker thought: pack them inside the upper walls enclosing the six-acre summit of Jericho’s inner fortress.
“The shadow army?” Deker asked quietly.
“Yes,” Ram grunted.
“So there are at least as many more in the lower city wall?” Deker pressed, knowing that perimeter wall around the entire eight-acre city mound could theoretically hold almost twice as many troops.
“We do not speak of those,” Ram whispered gruffly.
At least, that’s what Deker thought he said. “What do you mean?”
Ram either didn’t understand him or was simply changing the subject. “The torches make it too bright in here. You are no longer my brother but a soldier. I don’t know you. Follow me at intervals.”
They crossed several more compartments and made their way past one of the mess halls before turning down a narrow flight of steps.
Deker could only marvel. This was a city within a city.
Although the tunnels in the wall were laid out in relatively straight lines, he quickly lost his sense of direction as he followed his guide up and down ladders and steps through various levels and compartments toward the middle of the north wall.
Their odyssey ended in a ghostly hall with a vaulted ceiling. The rotting wooden beams could barely support the caved-in roof, so a giant concrete pillar had been built to hold up the ramparts above.
And next to the pillar was the walled-up gate, its bricks a shade different from the rest of the interior wall.
But there was a problem. A lone stonemason stood before them in a dirty apron, wiping the grease from his hands with a blackened cloth. He wore a handkerchief knotted over his head, his angry eyes in his soot-smeared face looking Deker over.
“This is my relief?” he asked Ram.
“No.
Deker watched the mason crumple to the floor and stared at Ram. “What did you do that for?”
Ram said, “He’s going to die anyway, isn’t he? Either by your mud bricks or by Bin-Nun’s sword.”
Deker couldn’t really argue with that logic and didn’t have the time. The clock was ticking and he had to get to work.
Thanks to Ram, he had located the critical structural element in the north wall. It wasn’t the walled gate, as he had expected, but the concrete pillar. It was an impressive meter wide in diameter and ten meters tall.
“The mud bricks will remove this pillar, and removing this pillar will allow the rest of the wall to collapse on itself,” Deker tried to explain to Ram as he set out his C-4 bricks. “Just like a tree falling down.”
Ram looked up at the pillar thoughtfully and frowned. “But if you do that, then it will fall on top of the houses in the city below.”
Deker said nothing, but he could see the reality sinking in as Ram had pictured it. Deker hoped Ram didn’t have any relatives there. But from the size of Rahab’s extended family, that seemed unlikely.
“What about the walled gate?” Ram asked. “That part of the wall seems weaker.”
“This is better,” Deker said. “I can’t explain it now.”
He could definitely blow open the walled gate. The blast would turn the bottom five meters of the fortress wall to rubble. The problem was at the top of the wall. The ramparts above were reinforced like a bridge for the troops to march between watchtowers. Deker would need to blow up the top several meters of the wall to get it to fall properly. Otherwise the rubble would block the Israelites from entering the fortress.
The key was this pillar. A single shot down the center would take it out.
He didn’t need all ten bricks to take out this pillar and its section of the wall. But he had only one shot, and it would be messy. Ordinarily he’d use hundreds of small shots and control their timing with a handheld computer. Also, he’d usually have several days to prep this kind of blast. Now, however, he was trying to do it in less than an hour.
The big slowdown was loading the C-4 properly into the bottom of the pillar. Normally, he’d drill a few hundred holes for his explosives, each one less than two centimeters in diameter and a few centimeters deep. Tonight he was basically slapping bricks to a pillar, and had to take his time to place them properly.
He had one chance.
Deker worked quietly the next few minutes until he realized things were too quiet. Too late, he knew something was wrong and turned to see Ram holding a dagger.
“You!” Ram shouted, as if he’d never seen him before. “Spread your feet! Hands against the wall!”
Deker did as he was told and could feel the rough hands run over his body. “What are you doing?”
Ram spun him around and pushed the edge of his dagger under Deker’s chin. “Say nothing,” he said, his face close to Deker’s, breathing heavily. “Nothing.”
Ram must have heard something, because several torches bobbed up and down in the darkness and a deep voice boomed, “Ram, is that you?”
Deker remembered the voice from Rahab’s terrace.
“Look what I found!” Ram said, and kicked Deker in the groin.
The blow sent Deker doubling over in agony. He slid against the wall to the floor, groaning in pain.
Ram then reached down and pulled him up by the hair. “You’re in the hands of the Reahn National Guards now, Hebrew.”
In spite of his jarring pain, Deker managed to stand up on his feet.
“Excellent work, Captain Ram,” said Hamas, and Deker felt his eyes look him up and down, registering that the general was unimpressed with this Hebrew specimen. “Although I must say I was expecting a bit more coming from Bin-Nun.”
Deker stared as Hamas walked toward him with several guards behind him, mouth in a snarl.
“I see you’ve killed one of my men, Hebrew.” Hamas smiled. “When I’m done with you, you’ll wish you were as fortunate.”
A giant forearm swung out of nowhere across Deker’s face, and everything went black.
40
There was a flash of light, and Deker felt another blow to his head. He opened his eyes in time to see Ram pull back his iron-hard fist and then bludgeon him in the face again.
