yourself. Yank that manacle out of the wall and save us. Now!”
Her order was punctuated by an explosion that started at the top of the stairs, then reverberated through the ceiling. Dust poured down, coating the prisoners, and Kell began screaming hysterically, “We’re buried alive! We’re going to die!”
“Shut up!” Miranda and Ortega shouted in unison.
There was a short silence, then Kell muttered, “Well at least the explosion scared the rats away for now.”
Miranda laughed out loud at the ridiculous statement, then realized that the commotion had cleared her head, at least for the moment. It had helped Kell, too, apparently.
But Ortega was silent, so she prodded him warily. “Ortega? Are you okay?”
“I should have gotten you out of here when I had the chance. I’m sorry, Miranda. I got caught up in the game. I swore I’d never make that mistake again-never let my judgment get clouded by the thrill of the chase. But that’s who I am. I’ll never change. I’m just sorry you had to get mixed up in it.”
“Sheesh! Get over yourself,” she told him dryly. “I got into this mess all by myself, remember? You’re hallucinating worse than Jonathan if you think you’ve been calling all the shots.” She paused to kick viciously at the rat that had returned to gnaw on her shoe. “Get off me, goddammit! Jonathan, how long does this stupid drug last?”
“We’ll be dead long before it wears off,” the scientist assured her. “I’m covered with welts and my throat’s just about swollen shut. We’re running out of air, and even if Ortega manages to get free, we can’t dig out in time. I think we should all just stay quiet and still. Try not to breathe too much.”
“Actually, we need to breathe more, not less,” Miranda corrected him, suddenly inspired. “Your exercises combat fear, right? So we’re gonna do them. Ortega? You’re the one with the best chance, so I’ll count for you. Let’s go-Ow! Dammit! Something bit me on the neck! Something real this time. Ugh.”
“A spider?”
“Probably a bat,” Kell announced glumly. “I was wondering when they’d come out.”
A chill shot through Miranda’s spine, but she forced herself to laugh it off. Bats? How many more secret phobias did she have? Her own imagination was bad enough, but Kell’s was going to land her in the loony bin!
“Ortega? You said I was our only hope, so do what I say. I’ll count, you breathe. Ready? Inhale. One…two… three…four…five…six…seven… Ow! Little bugger! Sorry. Exhale, one…two…three…four…five…six…seven… eight.”
She repeated the pattern, and was surprised to find that the simple act of counting, even without the long, deep breaths, was calming her a little. She could only hope that for Ortega, who could actually cleanse his body as well as his mind, the effects were even stronger. More steadying. Giving him the balance he so sorely craved, yet didn’t trust himself to find on his own.
As she counted, she decided he had the worst of it. Rats, darkness, even bats-the external enemies at least could be hated. But Ortega hated himself, or rather, something he was convinced was lurking inside himself. How could he hope to combat that? Add the fear drug into the mix, and he was probably in more danger than any of them if he didn’t get it under control.
She started counting more softly, just to be sure he was cooperating, and to her relief she could hear the powerful sound of his lungs, drawing the air in. Refusing to consider the fact that the dungeon was running out of oxygen more quickly now because of Ortega’s deep breathing, she forced herself to keep counting.
Kell hadn’t made a whimper for almost two minutes, and she assumed he had passed out. Then he surprised her by saying, “I’ll count, Miranda. You breathe with Ortega.”
There was something in his voice-not exactly courage, but at least, a hint of hope-and she realized that even he had benefited from the rhythmic counting.
He did a good job of it thereafter, speaking the sequence of numbers like a prayer. And in a way it was. For her part, she began breathing with Ortega, and by the time she reached her first sixteen-beat breath, she finally believed there was plenty of oxygen left in the room, because her lungs felt rejuvenated-as though they were drinking in the fresh alpine air outside the window rather than the musty fumes of the dungeon.
When Ortega finally spoke, his tone was confident and inspiring. “You two keep counting and breathing. I’m gonna get this goddammed foot free.” His chains began to rattle, but Miranda and Kell ignored all that, concentrating on their exercises, until the sound of mortar shattering made them squeal with delight and they lost count completely.
She wished she could see Ortega’s triumphant expression, but the room was too dark for that, so she settled for saying, “My hero! What now?”
“Honestly? I have no idea,” he admitted. “I’m trying to kick the pin out of the cuff on my other foot, but even if I get that one free, my hands don’t have any give.”
“Mine, either.” She pursed her lips. “Can you lift your leg up here enough to kick the pin out of one of my manacles?”
“I doubt it. I can’t even see you. I’d probably break your hand trying.”
“Try anyway.”
“Yeah, okay.” She heard him swing his foot, then she felt the blow on her shoulder and exclaimed, “Ow! I didn’t realize you were still wearing the stupid leg iron.” She laughed off his apology and insisted, “Try again. That was a little low. Aim higher.”
“I might hit you in the head with the chain. This isn’t working.”
She pursed her lips. “That metal is pretty sharp. Can you use it to dig out some of the stone near my foot? I’m pretty flexible. If my legs were free, I think I could get to your hands.”
“Worth a try. Tell me when I’m close.” He began thumping his foot against the wall, inching toward her.
“Stop! There, that’s perfect.” She gritted her teeth as he repeatedly plunged the sharp edge of his shackle into the rock beside her foot. Any miscalculation and he could shatter her ankle with one blow.
“Okay. Try it now,” he instructed, and she began tugging with her foot, pleased to feel mortar giving way. “It’s working! It’s-there!” The chain pulled completely free of the wall, and she immediately began to use that foot to pound the stone beside her other one.
Then she admitted, “You can do it faster, Ortega.”
She lifted her free leg out of the way, and he repeated his original process until she was able to dislodge her other shackle. Then she warned him, “When I swing my legs up to your shoulders, these chains will hit you, so keep your eyes closed. And I’m sorry in advance, because I think it’s going to hurt.”
“Just do it.”
She swung her body like a pendulum, higher and higher, until she made contact with his chest, then she “climbed” him to his shoulder, where she rested both ankles, while prying one tennis shoe off with the other one. Then she used her toes to feel her way up to the manacles on his wrists.
“The pin had a head at the top,” Ortega told her. “I’ll try to take the pressure off my left wrist so you’ll have a little more play in it. It’s rusty, so I’m hoping it’ll be loose.”
“Actually, it’s pretty tight,” she muttered, wedging her big toe under the head of the iron pin, prying carefully. When she had finally managed to edge it up a bit, she was able to grab it between her toes and slowly but surely worked it free.
“Unbelievable.” Ortega used his now free hand to lower her legs gently back down to the ground. Then she heard him unpin his other hand and foot.
“Hey.” His hands made tentative contact with her through the darkness, followed by a hearty, full-body embrace. “Man, you feel good.”
“So do you.” She laid her head against his chest for a moment, then insisted, “Free my hands. We don’t have much time. And at some point, we really will run out of air.”
“Agreed.” He unlocked her wrists, then moved toward Kell. “Jonathan? You awake?”
“Here.” The scientist’s voice was weary. “You two are amazing. But it’s all pointless. We’ll run out of air before we can dig out.”
“Maybe so,” Ortega said. “But we have to try. At least we won’t die in chains.”
“And you’re forgetting about our secret allies,” Miranda reminded them. “The monks. Remember, Jonathan? They made sure there were at least two ways out of every room.”
“This isn’t a room. It’s a dungeon. The whole point is to keep people in,” Kell reminded her.
Ortega’s hand found Miranda’s in the dark and he grasped it firmly. “If you’re right, then we need to start
