The Bone Labyrinth (57 page)

Finally the doors sealed shut behind him with a grinding thud.

He waited a full breath in case the mechanism needed time to reset. Then he reached over and plucked one of the metal balls from its socket. As before, a loud chime immediately sounded, a strike of metal on crystal.

With the timer again activated and the countdown restarted, Gray fled low across the floor, hoping to make it through the library door before being spotted.

No such luck.

A spatter of gunfire erupted from the stairwell, cracking and ricocheting off the quartz tiles at his heels. He dove across the library’s threshold and rolled farther into the room.

Seichan was there to pull him to his feet. Together they raced behind the nearest bookcase, putting that wall of metal-plated books between them and the door.

“The others?” he asked.

“Two rooms back and to the left. Told them to keep moving if we can’t hold them off here.”

Another of the chimes echoed.

She grumbled at him. “Like a team of commandos wasn’t enough of a threat?”

He showed her the metallic sphere still in his palm. “If need be, I can reset that timer. Maybe even use the marble as a bargaining chip. And in the worst-case scenario, I end up creating the world’s biggest distraction.”

“You like to live loose and fast, Gray.”

“Right now I’ll just take
living
.”

Furtive movements sounded out in the next room. Something rolled across the threshold, bobbling and spinning across the tiles.

A grenade.

Okay, now that’s a better bargaining chip.

Seichan grabbed him, and they both dove away.

2:31
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Lena involuntarily ducked at the sudden blast. Even from two rooms away, a flare of brilliance reached their hiding place, etching the shelves and the threshold of the door ahead.

She crouched with Roland and Jembe behind a bookcase. Roland shaded a small penlight with his palm, his face lined by worry.

The boy tugged at her sleeve. “Ms. Lena,” he said, trying to get her attention.

She realized he was probably scared. He had been clinging to her, trying to get her to listen to him. She put an arm around him.

“We’ll be okay,” she tried to reassure him, though it felt more like she was trying to convince herself.

“No. I must tell you.”

She turned and read the urgency in his eyes. “What?”

He told her.

Roland heard him, too, and grabbed her arm. “We have to warn the others.”

2:32
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Seichan groaned and picked herself up off the floor. The explosive device hadn’t been a grenade, but a flashbang meant to stun and soften an enemy. If not for the shelter of packed shelves, she would have been blinded. But the concussion and noise still felt like a giant had slapped both sides of her head with its palms.

Gray looked no better as he rolled to a low crouch, his pistol raised.

They had retreated to the next room. Gray took one side of the door while she kept to her feet on the other. She spied high while Gray remained low, both of them searching the room they had vacated.

Shadows shifted out there.

Gray fired once—earning a satisfying cry of pain. It wasn’t a mortal wound, but it got their attention.

Guessing the enemy came equipped with night-vision gear, Seichan reached to her belt and thumbed loose a small penlight. She flicked it on and whipped it out into the shelves. It wasn’t exactly a flashbang, but the sudden flare of brilliance would momentarily blind their sensitive night-vision equipment, stinging any eyes wearing such gear.

“Smart,” Gray whispered.

The penlight also revealed a pair of enemies, who fled from that well of brightness. She and Gray both fired. She hit one in the meat of his upper thigh, sending him flying behind a case. Gray clipped the other under his ear, dropping him flat.

One down
.

But the enemy was not so easily cowed. Other forces were flanking wide, keeping out of sight. There were too many. She knew it was time to retreat even farther and get the others moving even deeper.

Before she could turn, lights flared brighter, flowing in from the crystal room, a strange crimson flickering.

Then gunfire erupted—at first sporadically, then more fiercely.

Shouts and screams rose, full of blood and pain.

What the hell?

A black uniformed shape came hurtling toward them, straight between two bookcases—then the man’s throat exploded, sending him flying forward. A long arrow protruded from his throat. He crashed to the floor, snapping the shaft. The victim crawled toward them, gasping, then his back arched, foam flecking his lips.

She glanced down to the arrowhead on the floor.

Poison
.

Footfalls erupted behind her. She swung around with her weapon raised.

“It’s Lena and Roland,” Gray warned before she fired.

The boy came with them.

Gray waved them all to the side.

Lena exclaimed breathlessly. “It’s Jembe’s tribe.”

Seichan glanced to the boy, who nodded vigorously.

“Chakikui told me to take the bad people in here. So I do, but he also say in secret that my people are in the forest. I try to tell you.”

Seichan realized the boy was right. After hearing about the threat, they had all bum-rushed the skinny kid up the stairs and into hiding.

A ringing chime scolded her, sounding much louder now.

As it faded, she noted the fierce firefight had died down to sporadic bursts, echoing from deeper in the library, coming from neighboring rooms as the ambushers drove the Chinese farther back.

“What now?” Roland asked.

“We have to hightail it out of here,” Gray said.

“Why?”

“I dropped the ball.” He showed Seichan his palms. “In this case, literally. I had the marble in my hand, but when that flashbang blew, I lost it.”

Of course, you did. Nothing was ever easy with Gray
.

He studied the dark room, his expression grim. They didn’t have time to find and replace the lost puzzle piece, especially with an unknown number of enemies still waiting in the shadows.

Another chime sounded, full of dire warning.

“We’ll have to make a run for it,” Gray announced. “Jembe, you find one of your people. Let them know to clear out, too.”

The boy nodded.

Gray clapped him on the shoulder and turned to everyone else. “Ready?”

No one was, but they had no other choice.

2:37
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“
Let’s go.”

Gray lifted his pistol and swung around the doorjamb. He rushed low in the next room; the others followed his example. He skirted around the dead man and out past the towering bookcases. He paused behind the last one, eyeing the door that opened into the crystal chamber.

It appeared unguarded.

More bodies lay on the floor, both in this room and beyond the threshold; most wore black commando gear, a few only loincloths. Several torches burned out there, abandoned in the crystal chamber.

Deeper in the library, gunshots occasionally rang out.

But that wasn’t what worried Gray.

The crystal chamber quaked with another resounding clang.

Time was almost up.

Knowing they could wait no longer, he burst toward the open door. But a dark shape leaped into view at the last moment. Jembe yelled out in his native language. Gray skidded to a stop—with the point of a poisoned arrow poised at his chest.

The tribesman had heard Jembe and shifted aside. The tall man spoke rapidly to the boy as the group fled the library. Jembe pointed up the stairs. The man nodded, cupped his lips, and cast out a loud warbling whistle, recalling his fellow tribesmen.

Gray gripped the warrior’s forearm in thanks. Any further demonstration of appreciation would have to wait. “C’mon,” he ordered the others.

As he sprinted for the stairs, the final chime sounded, rising again toward the same dire crescendo. Once it reached its peak, the ground bucked under his legs, sending him sprawling. The others fared no better; only Jembe kept his balance.

Around them, plates of obsidian crashed down from the ceiling and shattered into sharp shards. Pillars rocked and cracked.

Gray got everyone up. “Move!”

Behind him, natives dashed out of the library.

Gray led them all up the stairs and across the next chamber, the one covered in elaborate mosaics. As the world continued to shake, tiles rained to the floor, dissolving the images of animals and their caretakers from the walls.

A roaring rush echoed behind him.

Water
.

His ears popped as the air pressure spiked higher. He pictured floodwaters filling the mysteries below and rising rapidly toward them, squeezing this only pocket of air.

As he fled, one certainty grew.

Atlantis was sinking for a final time.

2:38
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“
We must go,” Major Sergeant Kwan warned Shu Wei.

She stood amid shadowy bookshelves as cold water washed over her boots. The quaking had toppled shelves all around, knocking loose massive volumes bound in black metal. The brown-skinned natives who had ambushed her team had already fled the rising tide.

A part of her wanted to remain here, to accept her defeat with a measure of grace and honor, but a larger fire burned inside her.

For revenge
.

Limping on a twisted ankle, she set off. Kwan came forward and helped her, hooking an arm around her waist. Normally she would have shunned such assistance, taking it as a sign of weakness, especially for a woman in the army.

Instead, she leaned more heavily into him, sensing his support was born of more than mere loyalty. His strong arm held her firmly. She would reserve her own strength to deal with her enemy.

She intended to become like the man who held her.

To become a Black Crow, a merciless force who took what was owed.

By the time they reached the exit to the library, the waters had risen to her thighs. Kwan now half carried her, wading swiftly. But a familiar figure blocked the way out.

The old tribesman held a stretched bow, balancing an arrow on his thumb.

It seemed she was not the only one seeking revenge.

Kwan lifted his assault rife with his free arm, but before he could fire, a sharp twang sounded from the right. An arrow pierced his wrist, knocking loose his weapon. Before he could recover it, his body was slammed forward, impaled from behind by a long spear. Blood coughed from his lips.

As Kwan splashed face-first into the water, Shu Wei toppled to the side.

Hands grabbed her from behind, lifted her to her feet, and held her there.

She could have tried to fight, but her waterlogged gear weighed her down and her left leg throbbed in pain.

Instead she stood firm, ready to accept death.

The old tribesman remained at the door, his bowstring tautly drawn.

She stared defiantly back at him as he let his arrow fly.

2:43
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Gray raced down the long hall inscribed with ancient languages. Huge cracks had split the rows of script. Ahead, an entire section of the floor had broken and shifted askew. As he fled with the others across this shattered landscape, the ground continued to tremor, warning that the worst was yet to come.

I don’t want to be here when that happens
.

He pictured the city crumbling away into a watery grave.

He slowed to help Lena, noting she had begun to falter. Seichan tried to assist Roland, but he shook her hand loose.

“I can make it,” he gasped out.

The only ones who seemed unfazed by the long, desperate sprint were the clutch of warriors behind them. If anything, the natives appeared to be holding back, making sure Gray and the others made it to safety. Especially Jembe, who danced back and forth through them like an excited puppy, but fear shone brightly in his eyes.

Finally the group reached the flight of stairs that led down to the city’s flooded entrance. Without slowing, they flew down the spiral stairs. Gray ran a palm along the outer wall to keep his balance.

Suddenly the steps became dangerously slippery, coated with wet moss. His fingertips found the same on the walls. He realized the flooding here must have receded, as the surrounding water table drained into the city’s lower levels.

Gray began to slow, wary of the slick and treacherous footing.

Then a huge boom shook the stairs, accompanied by a mighty cracking of rock. Fist-size stones came bouncing and careening down from the upper levels, along with an occasional boulder the size of a pumpkin.

It was all coming down.

Forgoing caution, Gray ran faster, doing his best to avoid being hit from behind by the larger rocks. The group finally piled the rest of the way down and reached where the stairs vanished underwater.

“Everyone stay together!” he hollered. “Help your neighbor if needed!”

He sent Lena ahead, then Roland.

Jembe pushed Seichan from behind, shoving both palms on her rump. “Go!”

Gray didn’t argue with the boy and grabbed Seichan’s hand. Together they dove into the water and swam down the last turns of the spiral and along a straight tunnel.

Lena and Roland kicked ahead of them, fighting to get free.

Finally they all reached the short flight of stairs that led up to the exit tunnel. They surfaced one after the other, gasping for air. Earlier, the narrow passageway had been flooded almost to the roof. Now the waters splashed around their calves. Exhausted, they marched single file along the final stretch and back to the river pool.