She took his hand and repeated the same words, more softly this time. 'I'm staying with you.'
He looked down at the union of their hands and then back into her eyes.
'Then stay behind me at all times. We're going no more than half a mile. We can't afford to waste any more time if we're---'
A blinding light flared from the north. They both whirled toward where one of the torches burned so brightly it appeared as though the sun itself had been captured inside that iron cage. A shape advanced in their direction, made shadow by the brilliant glare behind it. Based on the figure's size and stature, there was only one man it could have been.
'What are you guys doing out here?' Sorenson shouted. 'You should be back inside the walls with the others.'
'We lost Dahlia and Jay,' Sam called over the deluge.
'I'll send them along when I see them.' He crumbled something in his hands and threw it onto the next torch in the series. The low flames expanded with a dazzling white light. He slid the remainder of what looked like a rusted chunk of metal through the grate. 'They won't stay lost long. You can probably see these fires from space.'
Sorenson smiled briefly before he lowered his brow in an expression of confusion. He turned and struck off toward the edge of the forest. As he walked, he shouldered an automatic rifle.
'Where are you going?' Sam asked.
'I thought I saw something---' Sorenson said, but the storm drowned out the rest of his words.
Raindrops the size of marbles pounded down on them with increasing force. Even the branches above no longer provided adequate protection. They were going to have to seek shelter, and soon.
Sam trailed Merritt as they followed Sorenson toward the line of shrubbery. He crouched and surveyed the shadowed jungle before returning his attention to the ground in front of him. They were nearly at his side when they caught a circular flash of reflected light. The tiny red light beside the lens on Jay's digital recorder diffused into the standing water.
Sorenson's stare never left the jungle as he lifted the video camera out of the mud.
'It's still recording,' he said, passing it back to her over his shoulder. He rose and scrutinized the dense vegetation down the barrel of his rifle.
Leaves and twigs littered the area as though torn from their moorings by a tornado. The ground was choppy with a riot of footsteps. When Sorenson took his first step into the brush, the absence of his shadow revealed that the mud here was a deeper shade of black than the rest.
Sam stared at the camera. There was no denying to whom it belonged. The spotlight mounted to it was shattered and the lens cracked, and yet still it vibrated softly as the digital feed continued to record. She wanted to call for Jay, but something stopped her. There was no way he would have willingly abandoned his camera, his very lifeblood. Not unless something horrible had happened.
Sorenson's footsteps slurped and crunched on the mud and detritus.
'We should get out of here,' Merritt said. 'I don't like this. Something's not right here.'
Leaves rustled and branches snapped as Sorenson shoved through the underbrush.
'We were just standing thirty feet from here,' Sam said.
That thought chilled her. Something had happened on this spot, a mere ten yards from where they had waited at the trailhead, something awful, and they had been completely oblivious.
'Jesus Christ,' Sorenson gasped. He held back the leathery leaves of a heliconia plant. The mud beneath it was gouged, and there was a trench as though something heavy had been dragged---
A hand. There was a hand on the ground, collecting rain in the palm. The fingers curled inward, minus the middle finger, which was a blunt, ragged stub. Skin muddy and torn, the wrist a collection of jagged bones and severed tendons where it had been torn from the forearm. What could have been an upper arm or a lower leg lay past it, a bloody long bone missing large chunks of muscle and flesh.
Sam clapped her hand over her mouth and turned away, only to see a large clump of blonde hair, still attached to a swatch of scalp, tangled in the branches.
'We're out of here,' Merritt said. 'Make no sudden movements. Slowly back away.'
Sam could hear herself crying as though from miles away, but there was nothing she could do to stop it. She clung to the camera, its whirring mechanical heartbeat against her chest.
Her eyes darted from one shadow to the next. Even the gentle bowing of branches under the weight of the rain and the shifting of saplings brought the forest to life with menace. The flickering glow of the flames along the obsidian wall made her feel like there was someone behind her, but she couldn't force herself to so much as glance over her shoulder.
'As soon as we're clear of the jungle, I want you two to make a run for the collapsed section of the northern wall,' Sorenson said. 'I'll cover you from behind. Head for the main building at the center of the courtyard.'
'What about you?' Merritt asked.
'You'd better believe I'll be right on your heels.'
Merritt reached back and took Sam's free hand. She squeezed for dear life.
'You ready?' he asked. Sam couldn't summon the voice to respond. 'On my mark.' The tension on her arm increased. 'Now!'
She spun around and sprinted toward the sheer, vine-shrouded fortification, careful not to look directly into the flames for fear of creating blind spots in her vision. Her legs churned and her feet slipped in the muck, but Merritt pulled her onward. They rounded the corner and sprinted toward the crumbled mound of stones.
Behind her, the savage light faded, allowing the darkness to again enfold them.
She risked a glance back as they ascended the rubble.
There was no sign of Sorenson.
She hadn't heard any shots fired, but she didn't find that comforting in the slightest.
II
Leo shielded his eyes from the rain and surveyed their work. The entire front half of the structure glowed as though struck by the midday sun. Colton had just finished crumbling the edges of the thermite onto the once- diminutive flames to make them flare with blinding intensity, and had laid the bricks in the heart of the iron chambers. They had yet to determine how long the thermite would burn with such force, but surely they had more than enough stacked in the main chamber to get them through the night. At least that should buy them enough time to figure out what they were going to do next.
Once the storm abated, they would merely have to get far enough away from the mountain to escape the magnetic interference. With just a few precisely placed phone calls, Leo could have them airlifted out of there in no time. It would cost him an arm and a leg, but once he returned with the properly outfitted group and the necessary supplies, he would easily be able to recoup his loss with the sheer amount of gold under his feet. Maybe he'd have the entire mountainside napalmed first. That would take care of whatever stalked the ruins once and for all. He just hoped he would have the opportunity to see the expressions cooked onto the charred faces of the creatures that had slaughtered his son's men, and had cost him the one thing in his life that had ever truly mattered.
'What's the plan from here?' he asked Colton, who, having finished his task, strode back toward the entrance to the building.
'We bolster our defenses. Fill the gaps where the structure has crumbled over time and clear some of this godforsaken jungle. We'll run two-man patrols at the perimeter, and station another two at the lone remaining doorway. We can't trust the civilians with the weapons or our lives, so they'll be penned inside the main chamber. You too, Leo.'
Leo didn't even consider arguing. He recognized his shortcomings. And, after all, this was what he was paying them for.
He turned and surveyed the courtyard. A wall of tangled trees and shadows waited at the edge of the light's reach, roughly twenty-five feet away. Morton and Webber walked uneasily through the trees, burdened by the
