Jack noticed that they would avert their eyes from her as she passed by. Perhaps that was why she wore the veils, Jack thought. Perhaps she was so revered by the N’watu that they were not allowed to even look upon her.
The woman approached Jack and Ben. She was shorter than he’d expected, standing only up to Jack’s shoulders. In the dim light, Jack could see hints of ghostly white flesh beneath the layers of veils. She stretched a pallid hand toward Jack’s face without making contact. Her bony fingers were tipped with long nails filed down to sharpened points like talons and dyed as black as ink. They hovered less than an inch from his skin. As though she could feel him without actually touching him.
Then Jack caught sight of an amulet hanging down her chest. A round medallion fashioned from some sort of metal, with markings identical to the drawing he’d seen in his father’s papers. Jack froze as he recognized it. He didn’t dare move or he knew they would kill him. But in the dim light he could definitely see it was the same design.
The woman muttered something else that Jack could not understand. Strident, guttural words that seemed to drip with venom. Her voice was raspy and soft—both acerbic and somehow still feminine, something wholly unnerving to Jack. He could see the glimmer of her white eyes glowing behind the veil.
Then she turned her attention to Ben and seemed more intrigued by him than by Jack, perhaps seeing he was from one of the local tribes. She reached her hand up and this time made contact, sliding her elongated, talon- like fingers gently down his cheek and jaw.
Jack tried to see beneath her veil but could make out no discernible features or expression. Just a vague white outline of her countenance and her two colorless eyes. But the medallion consumed his thoughts. If he could only get his hands on it…
The woman stepped back and spoke again, her tone different.
Jack glanced at Ben, whose expression seemed calm. He replied,
Jack’s eyebrows went up. Ben understood their language? Or perhaps the N’watu knew the Caieche language. Either way, if they could communicate, they might be able to talk their way out of this situation. Explain that they didn’t mean any harm and weren’t a threat.
“You can understand them?” he whispered.
Ben didn’t take his eyes off the woman. “She speaks Caieche. The
The N’watu men growled and pushed the tips of their spears closer against Jack’s neck. Jack swallowed; they apparently didn’t approve of them speaking to each other.
The woman spoke again—Jack couldn’t tell if it was to them or to her warriors. He tried to back away, but they crowded him closer. They were outnumbered, and Jack knew he wouldn’t be able to put up much of a fight before getting a spear thrust into his chest or throat.
In a kind of detached way, he saw what was left of his life play out in his mind. The N’watu would either kill them both here and feed their carcasses to the cave spiders or tie them up, drag them out to the bone pit, and let the spiders devour them alive. He hoped grimly it would be the former.
“Ben,” Jack whispered, “I don’t think this is going to end well….”
“Close your eyes.”
Jack had been hoping for something a little more encouraging. Frankly, that advice sounded a bit too defeatist for Ben.
“What?”
“Just close your eyes.” Ben’s tone was deliberate and tense. Maybe he hadn’t given up after all.
Jack closed his eyes just as the cave erupted into chaos. He could hear unintelligible shouts and a high- pitched shriek. Someone slammed into Jack’s shoulder, knocking him to the side at the same time that something sharp sliced across his upper arm.
Jack toppled over, and his eyes snapped open. A blaze of light sent bolts of pain into his skull. He was barely able to make out the image of Ben holding a bright-orange flare in one hand and with the other fighting off a barrage of flailing limbs and spears.
Above the tumult, he heard Ben’s voice shouting, “Run!”
Jack scrambled to his feet and flipped on his flashlight as Ben plowed through the group of warriors toward the tunnel from which they had first entered. Jack followed close behind.
His own eyes throbbing from the brightness, Jack could only imagine how the N’watu—who’d spent their entire lives underground—were feeling. But he knew they had only a few seconds to escape before the warriors recovered from their temporary blindness.
Jack stumbled through the chaos. He could feel hands clawing at him, trying to get a grasp. He swung his arms around, hard. Clutching one of the spears, he sliced and stabbed, hoping he could inflict at least some damage. He felt the weapon making contact with several other bodies and hoped desperately that none of them were Ben.
He fought through the confused and blinded warriors, following what he thought was Ben’s voice, but within moments, the howls of pain around him crowded everything else out, and he could feel hands clutching his arms and legs. They were groping for his head and neck, thrusting their spears wildly into the light.
Then Jack heard Ben calling him. “Over here!”
Jack followed in the direction of his voice but so did the N’watu warriors. Jack caught a glimpse of Ben amid flashes of light and darkness. He too had managed to commandeer one of their spears and stood by the tunnel, now with two flares and his flashlight blazing through the chamber.
Jack stumbled past him, into the tunnel, back toward the wooden door, not sure exactly why he was going that way. Maybe they could get through the door and hold off the mob.
He came to the black wood of the doorway and pushed it open, the counterweights on the inside making it easy to lift. A moment later Ben was beside him. But now they faced another dilemma. They needed to brace the door somehow, to block it so the N’watu couldn’t follow them. Or at least to delay them for a few minutes.
Then Jack had an idea. “I’ll hold the door, and you cut the ropes!”
Jack held up the massive wooden door while Ben crouched down and sliced his knife across the ropes holding the counterweights. The first one snapped, and the door shuddered. Jack grunted at the sudden addition of weight now transferred to him. He jammed the spear underneath to keep it propped up.
Jack could hear the N’watu approaching up the tunnel. Ben threw two flares into the passage. Maybe that would slow them down. Then Ben sliced the second rope and rolled back through the door as Jack let it slam shut.
He lay gasping for breath while Ben wedged the spear into the mud at the base of the door.
“We have to go,” Ben said. “I don’t think this is going to hold them for long.”
Jack rolled to his feet and gathered himself. Now they were out in the cave with the spiders. He was relieved to be free from the N’watu but couldn’t help feeling they had only jumped right back into the fire.
“Go where?” Jack breathed as they headed down the passage toward the bone pit. “If there was another way out, it was probably back there.”
“Then we go back the way we came in,” Ben said. “We just keep an eye out for those spiders.”
“We can’t get out that way.”
But Ben seemed undeterred. “We’ll figure something out. Or we’ll find another way.”
They reached the ledge overlooking the inky blackness of the bone pit and paused to catch their breath.
“And what if there isn’t one?” Jack said.
Ben shook his head. “There’s
They lowered themselves over the ledge into the bone pit, climbing down the pile of human remains as they had done before. They reached the bottom and paused to listen for any of the cave spiders’ telltale clicking sounds.
The place seemed deserted. Jack swept his light across the muddy ground and spotted the still-fresh puddle of blood. He quickly averted his eyes, not wanting to see anything of Rudy’s remains.
Ben seemed to sense Jack’s uneasiness and tapped his shoulder. “C’mon, let’s find that tunnel on the other side.”
They climbed up the slope out of the pit and were starting across the cavern when Ben motioned for Jack to
