The priest’s words were whispered, breathless, oddly formal. “The Church has prior claim to what lies within this crypt.”
Father Korza started to step past him. Jordan grabbed his arm—but only caught air. Somehow the priest smoothly shrugged out of his way and stalked toward the open sarcophagus.
Jordan followed, noting the priest’s eyes fix to the child staked to the wall, his face unreadable. Reaching the tomb, the man glanced inside the empty sarcophagus and visibly tensed, going statue-still.
Erin approached him from the far wall. She held aloft her cell phone, plainly searching for a signal, hoping to get her photographs uploaded somewhere safe, always thinking like a researcher.
As she reached the sarcophagus, Jordan kept between her and Father Korza. For some reason, he didn’t want her near the strange priest.
“This is a restricted area,” Jordan warned.
Perlman backed him up, resting a palm on his sidearm. “You should not be here, Father Korza. The Israeli government set strict guidelines on your visit here.”
The clergyman ignored them both. He focused on Erin. “Have you found a book? Or a block of stone of such size?” He held out his arms.
Erin shook her head. “We found nothing like that, just the girl. It looks like the Germans cleared this tomb during the war.”
His only reaction was a slight narrowing of his eyes.
Jordan placed his hand on the butt of his machine pistol, waiting to see what the holy man would do next. Brusque and taciturn, the priest had obvious issues with authority, but so far he’d shown no outward signs of threat.
Peripherally, Jordan watched McKay slip a hand to his own dagger.
“Easy, Corporal,” he ordered. “Stand down.”
The priest ignored McKay, but he suddenly tensed, freezing in midturn, his ear cocked to the side. He made eye contact with Jordan, but his words were for all of them.
“You must all leave.
The last word bristled with warning.
The answer came from Jordan’s earpiece: a scream burst forth, full of blood and pain, sharp enough to stab deep into his head.
The scream cut off into a burst of static.
He touched the throat mike. “Sanderson! Respond!”
No reply.
“Corporal, come in!”
The priest moved swiftly to the entrance. Cooper and the young Israeli soldier blocked him from leaving. Weapons were raised all around.
At the threshold to the tomb, the priest lifted his face toward the roof, his whole body going rigid, like a big cat before an attack. His next words were chilling for their calmness.
“Back against the walls.” He turned and locked eyes with Jordan. “Do as I say or you will all die.”
Jordan raised his weapon. “Are you threatening us, padre?”
“Not I. The ones who
Erin struggled to comprehend what was happening. The priest’s gaze met hers. For a moment a flicker of fear broke through the pale contours of the priest’s face, long enough to drive her heart into her throat. She sensed that he worried for their safety, not his own. A terrible sadness haunted his eyes as he looked away, as if he already mourned them.
She swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry.
But Jordan was clearly not giving up so easily. “What’s going on? I’ve got men topside. As does Lieutenant Perlman.”
Again that mournful look. “By now, they are dead. As you shall be if you do not—”
A gasp rose from Cooper, who stood by the door. Everyone turned. He opened his mouth, but only blood flowed out. He collapsed to his knees, then his face. The black hilt of a dagger jutted from the base of his skull.
Erin cried his name. The soldiers raised their guns as one. She stepped behind them, out of the line of fire.
Beyond Cooper’s body crouched a dark shape, a figure sculpted from shadows. Jordan fired multiple volleys, blasts deafening in the closed space. The shadow shivered back into darkness—
—but not before snagging the young Israeli soldier who was still hovering near the threshold. Erin caught a glint of steel, then he was gone, yanked off his feet and into the black tunnel.
Jordan stopped firing, plainly fearing he’d hit the soldier.
A scream, full of terror and blood, echoed—then silence.
Lieutenant Perlman lurched forward, weapon up. “Margolis!”
The priest’s black-clad arm shoved the Israeli back.
Hard.
“Stay here,” Father Korza warned, then defied his own words.
With a turn of his wrist, a blade appeared in his fingers as if out of thin air. He bared the edge: a sickle of silver, a hooked dagger, like some prehistoric claw.
With a sweep of his jacket, he dove across the threshold and vanished.
Immediately a savage wailing keened out of the darkness.
The sound sang to fears buried in her bones and bound her in place.
Even the hardened soldiers seemed to sense it. Jordan drew her farther from the entrance. McKay and Perlman flanked them, weapons pointed at the door. Retreating, regrouping, they took cover behind the sarcophagus.
A single piercing scream ripped from the tunnel.
Jordan lifted Erin as effortlessly as if her bones were hollow, her flesh immaterial. She felt that way already, as if she could float away.
He rolled her into the open sarcophagus. “Stay down, stay hidden.”
The steel in his voice and iron in his eyes grounded her back in her own skin—not that she wanted to be there. He pressed her lower. “Do you understand?”
“Yes.” She wanted to duck away, cover her head, shut out the horror, but when she did, sightlessness scared her more. Her fingers clung to the lip of the box. Like everyone else, she watched the pitch-dark mouth of the tunnel.
To the left, a sharp strike and flash drew her eye. McKay held a flaming flare.
“Toss it!” Jordan pointed to the dark exit.
McKay swung his arm and tossed the flare through the doorway. It tumbled end over end, leaving a trail of fire, and plunged into the well of darkness. Brightness forced back shadows, along with darker shapes. Erin lost count at four.
That left a lone figure in the center, standing in a shredded cassock, lit from the back. He held an arm over his eyes, blinded by the sudden flare. His other hand held up a curved dagger, blade dripping black blood, shimmering with reflected fire.
“Father!” Jordan yelled, raising his weapon. “Get down!”
The warning came too late.
Like rabid dogs, shadowed shapes leaped at the priest. They slammed him down. He landed hard atop the flare, quenching it with his body. Erin winced. Darkness again swallowed the scene—but not before a figure bounded over the priest and leaped headlong into the chamber.
It flew far, hit the stone floor, then shot straight at them, moving impossibly fast. A wolf? No. A man in
