rank as one of the greatest escapes ever, up there with Beranabus’s finest death-defying shimmies. I almost want to survive just to prove to the magician that he’s not the only cat with nine lives.
Before I can dwell on that grim possibility, Shark barks a command. As we sprint down the opposite side of the incline, all other fears and thoughts are forgotten. Running… werewolves… the cave. There’s no room inside my head for anything else.
CAVEMEN
The howls intensify as we run, coming from all directions, a cacophony of wolfen roars tightening around us like a net. But we don’t spot another werewolf until, cutting our way through a small copse, one leaps from a tree without warning and drags Shark to the ground. The pair roll away from us, and though the soldiers in our group swiftly train their weapons on the beast, I’m sure they’re too late. I resign myself to the loss of our leader.
But Shark isn’t ready for the grave just yet. Staggering to his feet, he shoulders the howling werewolf away. The others can’t shoot because he’s in their way, and Shark lost his gun in the attack.
“Down!” Stephen yells, desperate to put a bullet through the werewolf’s head.
Shark has other ideas. Jerking a knife from his belt, he leaps on the savage beast and drives the blade into its stomach, chewing on its left ear for extra impact. The werewolf screams and claws at Shark’s back, ripping his shirt and much of his flesh to shreds. But Shark jabs at it a second time and a third, and its hands drop away. Moments later he shrugs it off and hobbles free.
“Are you OK?” Meera asks as he rejoins us, casting a worried look at his injuries.
“I’ve cut myself worse shaving,” Shark grunts. He retrieves his rifle and pushes up beside Timas, ignoring the blood pooling around the waistband of his trousers.
As we clear the copse, we spot an army of werewolves surging towards us from our far left. The beasts at the front look like they’re part of the enhanced breed. We can also hear crashing and snapping sounds in the trees behind us—the pack from the compound has almost caught up.
“There!” Timas shouts, swivelling right. I can’t see anything except a lot of rocks jutting out of the ground, but he seems sure of himself. As we hurl ourselves after Timas, I pray desperately that his map-reading skills were as accurate as he led us to believe.
I don’t look back as we run, but I hear the werewolves closing in. The creatures who’ve been chasing us from the compound have merged with those arriving fresh on the scene to create a chorus of howls and screeches that could drown out the sound of a nuclear detonation. I feel hot breath on the back of my neck. I hope it’s just my imagination.
Timas reaches a rock, grabs it with his left hand and pivots, lobbing a bomb over our heads as he swings out of sight. The explosion and screams of the werewolves are music to my ears. But as I come in line with the rock and duck around it, I catch sight of the beasts, no more than several metres behind, and my glee shrivels up like the petals of a flower at the heart of a furnace.
There’s no sign of Timas. For a horrified second I think he’s been snatched by a werewolf. But then I see his bony arm and narrow fingers jerk out of a hole, beckoning us on.
Shark is next to make it. He dives in and Timas’ arm disappears. The rest of us come abreast of what looks like just a hole in the rock, less than a metre high. But as I look closer I see that the floor is lower than the ground out here, so you can stand inside. It’s more of a tunnel than an actual cave, but I’m not going to complain about that.
Shark pops up like a jack-in-the-box. He aims over our heads and fires at the werewolves. There’s a grunt three or four centimetres behind my ear and I realise they’re even closer than I feared.
Screaming madly, I wrap an arm around Meera’s waist and hurl her into the hole, like a basketball player making a slam dunk. She smashes against one of the walls inside the entrance and cries out with pain. But at least she’s out of the reach of the werewolves.
Prae ducks in after Meera and scurries forward. I almost collide with Stephen as we both try to push in at the same time. We pause and I flash on a ridiculous image of us standing here, politely muttering, “No, after
Meera and Prae have shuffled deeper into the cave. Timas is hooking up a series of devices to the walls around the entrance. For once he isn’t grinning. By his expression, you might even think he was slightly perturbed.
Shark is still standing half out of the cave, roaring as he empties his cartridge into the hordes of werewolves. Stephen falls into the cave backwards, firing as he topples. He takes out a werewolf which was just about to snap Shark’s head off.
“Back!” Timas yells.
Shark immediately withdraws. Liam, who was covering the rest of us from outside, dives into the hole after him. But he comes to a stop mid-air, arms outstretched, legs caught. He screams. Shark curses and grabs for Liam’s hands. He catches them and tugs hard. Liam screams again.
“Hold on!” Stephen shouts, wriggling forward, firing around Shark and Liam.
Liam jerks forward a few centimetres. It looks like Shark has him, but then he’s wrenched out of the cave.
For a brief moment I’m dazzled by sunlight. Then the hole fills with the heads and upper torsos of dozens of werewolves. They snap and lash at each other, fighting to be first in.
Before the werewolves can sort themselves out and slither into the cave, Timas yells, “Everybody down!” I catch sight of him pushing a button on a tiny detonator as I leap for safety. Then there’s the mother of all explosions and the roof around the entrance comes crashing down, muting the howls of the werewolves, plunging us into darkness, entombing us beneath the ground.
Nobody says anything for several minutes. We can’t—the air’s clogged with dust and bits of debris. We crawl away from the rubble in search of cleaner air, heads low, covering our faces with jackets and T-shirts, breathing shallowly. The roof slopes downwards and after a while we have to bend. When that becomes uncomfortable, we sit and wait for the air to clear. I’m exhausted. I could happily fall asleep where I’m sitting.
Shark breaks the silence. He coughs, spits out something, then says, “Who’s still alive?”
“Me,” Timas answers brightly.
“Me,” Prae Athim gasps.
“Me,” Stephen says morosely—I think he was good friends with Liam.
“Me,” I mutter through the fabric of my T-shirt, not ready to chance the air yet.
“Me,” Meera groans, “though I feel like half my ribs are broken. What the hell did you throw me in for, Grubbs?”
“I was trying to save you,” I growl.
“I could have saved myself,” she snaps.
“Ungrateful cow!”
“Chauvinist pig!”
We laugh at the same time.
“Cute,” Shark huffs. “Now somebody tell me they brought a torch.” Nobody says anything. “Brilliant. So we’re stuck here in the—”
Something glows. I tug my T-shirt down and squint at the dim light. It’s coming from Timas’ gun, from the small control panel I noticed earlier. Humming, Timas makes a few adjustments and the glow increases, just enough to illuminate the area around us. He looks up. His grin is firmly back in place, though it looks a bit eerie in the weak green light.
“Remind me to kiss you when this is over,” Shark says, struggling not to smile.
