Carry the Flame (39 page)

“Bliss,” she said softly, “stay back. Out of the light.”

W
hen the mines blew up, Linden watched everyone above the pit freeze. He also waited, wondering how long it would take for drunken pandemonium to break out. Only seconds. The Mayor triggered it by rushing to the edge, staring intently at the opening earth. Men rushed everywhere at once, giving the emissary the opportunity to walk up and casually knock the despot into what looked like a blackening abyss. Then the hairless man bolted toward Ananda, Leisha, and Kaisha, who were lifting their eyes to the roof as it started to crumble.

He grabbed the girls, whispering, “Run fast. I'm getting you out of here, somewhere safe.” When they failed to move, he forced them forward, glancing back every few seconds. Gunfire ricocheted all around them.

A
nanda hated the bald guy. The Mayor's best buddy was pushing her away from the pit, and she desperately wanted to see that her mother and Bliss were okay. But the falling torches gave her only a glimpse of the Mayor with his pistol. She wondered what he was doing down there. Was he going to shoot her mom and sister? It seemed that he and every man in the arena had a gun and a reason to fire wildly in the melee. But there were also screams and curses, and the howls of the maimed and dying.

She wanted to escape Linden but didn't know where to go. His pushes were keeping them just ahead of the falling bricks. She heard rubble hitting the ground just feet behind them, like hungry hounds chasing ever closer to their quarry.

Now Linden ordered them to hold hands. He pulled them along faster for several minutes, offering encouraging words with almost every step. “Don't worry,” he said. “I'll get you away from this.” Then he rushed headlong into a brick column and dropped Ananda's hand, cursing and groaning. “Come here!” he snapped, herding the kids into a corner, where he pushed their heads down and forced them into what felt like a cubbyhole. “Stay there. Don't move.” Linden sounded angry now, like most men. “I know where you are. I'll come back for you. Just stay put. I mean that.”

Ananda listened to him run off. When she was sure he was gone, she turned to the twins. “We've got to get out of here.”

“But he said to stay,” Leisha quarreled.

“Of course he did,” Ananda argued back. “He's one of them. He wants us safe because we're worth a lot. We're
not
staying.”

She crawled out, blinded by the darkness, then she pulled the girls to their feet. Just as she was about to lead them away, heavy footfalls made her freeze. The terrifying sounds hurried toward them.

Ananda heard the twins move.
Quiet,
she wanted to warn them, but couldn't. She put her hand on their chest, hoping they would stay still as the walls and that the men would pass. She smelled a rank odor, and feared her own scent would give them away.

We're animals, she thought, sniffing the air silently.

The footfalls grew louder, and she smelled sweat.

But they're worse,
she told herself as the hairs on the back of her neck prickled her skin.
They're beasts of the night.

She didn't understand how she could be so sure of this—and wondered where those exact words came from—but she knew it was true. And then she knew why. The answer came to her as simply as it had moments ago:
Because we're animals. We sense things.

The beasts of the night, invisible as phantoms, stepped so close that her nose now filled with their sour, boozy breath.

L
inden wondered whether he'd told the girls that he was working to free the caravaners. He'd been in a rush to get them out of the target zone, and then smashed his head into the brick column so hard it had left him dizzy. He was still reeling when he hid them in the empty weapons cache. But everything he'd said about taking them somewhere safe was hardly the message of an enemy. And he'd promised to come back for them.

Still, his doubts needled him, and he wanted to turn around. But he knew it was more urgent to get word to Sam and Yurgen and the others that while the roof did collapse, it looked like many of the guards, marauders, and Russians had been spared. The extermination must begin at once.

They'll be okay, he decided. They're too scared to move. Who wouldn't be in this madness?

But nothing felt certain in the City of Shade. Not his life. Not theirs. Especially if drunken men grabbed them in the darkness: those girls couldn't possibly imagine what that would mean. No one with a heartstring of decency could fathom the deranged mix of desire and murder that swirled through the minds of men so long denied the objects of their lust.

T
onga shifted his weight from foot to foot, and it seemed to Cassie that he was about to pounce. She jabbed her torch at the reptile—which appeared less frightened of the flame now—and backed up.

Behind her, deep layers of bones rose halfway up the slope she'd climbed with William. She thought he must be dead, or he would have waited for her. She checked the ground and saw a teddy bear mine about five feet to her right. Inches away, she spotted William's hand protruding lifelessly from a heavy pile of rubble, as if he'd pushed the bear away in his last seconds.

The sight of his hand startled Cassie, and made her feel more alone—more vulnerable—than ever. Even William had died.

A lifetime seemed to pass as she looked from the bear to the dragon. Finally, she forced her gaze back on the mine and screamed,
“Get it!”
to try to make herself move.

She edged toward the bear, guessing William had pushed the pin back into the mine to deactivate it. Otherwise, the explosions would have set it off. But she hoped not, because she hadn't been able to budge the pin when he'd given her the chance to pop it out in the storage area. That was why she'd had to carry both land mines ready to explode.

Tonga's tongue moved in and out of his mouth almost continually now, dripping strings of saliva, as if he were already digesting her. When he thrust out his tongue again, it darted so close, spittle landed on her pants, inches from her foot.

She parried with the torch. Despite her shaky hands, she fried inches of the organ, withdrawing the flame just before the beast bit down. The Komodo shuddered, perhaps with pain, but mostly, Cassie thought, the beast looked angry.

Almost choking with panic, she gazed down and saw that she'd managed to move within inches of the teddy bear.

With a halting breath, she reached for it, still holding out the torch, and dug her fingers into the ground to try to scoop the bear up gently. Even in fear's densest fog, she knew better than to seize the land mine.

Please be ready. Please.

She rose, fingers feeling the back of the bear to determine whether the pin had been pulled.
It has to be.

Holding out the flame, Cassie fended off the giant lizard while retreating to the very edge of the slope. Then she clenched the torch between her knees, moaning when she found the pin in place. Tears clouded her eyes.

She blinked away the blurriness, threaded her thin index finger through a metal loop, and pulled, with little hope of success. The pin didn't move, but the beast did, lunging within feet of her. She had to grab the torch and stick it in the dragon's face, unsure it would even stop him. The reptile did back up, but only a foot, more a dodge or feint than any sign of defeat.

You have to do this,
she pleaded with herself, knowing that if she failed to free the pin, the slobbering lizard would devour her.

Again she squeezed the torch between her knees, and with a strangling sense of panic grabbed the ring and jerked as hard as she could. Nothing. “No!” she burst out. “No!”

She tried again, so hard she thought the ring would slice off half her finger. It gave, but only slightly
.
Furious, she jerked it once more, and to her surprise freed it. But the force of her effort nearly whipped her hand and the bear into the torch handle. She stared, shocked at how close she'd come to killing herself.

The dragon attacked, and Cassie dropped the torch and saw it glance harmlessly off Tonga's open mouth. Panicking, sure she'd waited too long, she tossed the mine at the Komodo and hurled herself over the edge.

As she plunged toward countless bones, she looked back at the bear falling end over end in the last of the dying torchlight—and saw the enraged dragon diving after her.

J
ester climbed down the rope ladder into the dark cavern. Moving only by touch in a lunar silence, he descended into cooler, ever more moist air. The soothing temperature and humidity made him smile. And he felt confident, an invader well-equipped with his knife, to use the night to his favor. So strong and sure of himself that he wasn't prepared for the missing rung on the rope ladder.

He slipped so fast, the front of his feet snapped upright on the next rung and failed to arrest his fall. He plummeted past two more rungs before getting a death grip on the rope with his right hand, his only hold as he swayed over the black void.

Slowly, he looped his left leg around the ladder and found another foothold. Only then did he hear the echo of his terror—“Fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck”—and realize he must have screamed to set off such a long shadow of fear.

He looked down, wondering what else he'd set off.
Who's there?
He wasn't worried about iddy biddy bitch. He
wanted
to find her. But he knew you were a fool if you didn't worry about the threats you couldn't see—and he couldn't see a damn thing.

“A
nanda?” Linden called gently. “Leisha? Kaisha?” He'd searched the cubbyhole closet where he left them, and where they once secured the guns before the Mayor permitted the men to carry them freely. Linden had warned him to keep the firearms locked up, but the Mayor dismissed his concerns, saying airily, “Men must have guns to keep us safe at all times.” He wondered what the Mayor was thinking, with his men shooting drunkenly in the dark.
Feeling safe now?

“It's okay,” he whispered, hoping the girls were huddled nearby. He didn't think they would have traveled far in the chaos. He hadn't grabbed a torch, preferring the cover of night. “It's me, Linden.” He listened closely before going on. “I'm with the good guys. I'll get you back to your people. I promise.”

No response. All he heard was a spate of distant screams.

Where the devil did they go?

He stepped forward, ready to call softly again, when a hammer cocked on a pistol. He ducked and reached for his Ruger.

T
he tunnel from Chunga's pen was ending. Jessie held out the torch in alarm before seeing they'd come to a T-shaped intersection.

“We've got a decision,” she said to Burned Fingers, whose blood had dried in rusty streaks on his face.

The marauder pressed his blade into the Mayor's back. “Which way is out?” he demanded.

“We will go to the right,” the Mayor said in an imperious voice. The regal tone made Jessie want to beat him to death with a stick.

“I don't trust him,” Bliss said, still in the shadows a few steps behind them.

“And going right takes us where?” Burned Fingers smacked the Mayor's head with the butt of his knife.

Wincing, the Mayor said, “To the back of the city, near your big truck and van.”

“Isn't that convenient.” Burned Fingers shook his head in the dim light.

Too convenient
,
Jessie silently agreed.

“You can trust me,” the Mayor said loudly. “Always, I am a man of my word.”

From the dark recesses they'd left behind, they heard a
creak—
and the unmistakable racket of the dragon thrashing the circus wagon.

T
he teddy bear mine exploded, ripping a gaping wound in the Komodo's thick neck. But the shrapnel missed Cassie, streaking millimeters above her head as she fell just below the edge of the slope. With no torch, in utter darkness, she hoped to luck out and land on the narrow path she'd taken up there with William—and hit dirt on the higher part of the rise—but then she barreled right into the bones. The blunt impact scraped her back and legs and hurt horribly.

She balled up, trying to squeeze away the throbbing that overtook her. She hurt so much she didn't even listen for the dragon. And she was sure the bear had destroyed the beast.

So when Tonga trod heavily in the darkness, Cassie, filled with disbelief, forced herself to stand.
Just in case.
She backed up only when the dragon crunched bones less than ten feet away, finally conceding the nightmare of the giant lizard's continued existence.

Her heel smacked a skeleton, and it rattled so loudly she feared—as she would have with ghosts—that it would reach up and seize her for the reptile. Looking around, she saw nothing in the blackness, but heard a frightening snort from the creature as he lumbered close. She had to flee—
now!

She ran blindly over the endless, unknown dead, stumbling and falling on the bones, horrified that she would leave the catacombs in the belly of that hateful beast.

S
am tightened the knot on her white braid and pressed her shoulder against the edge of a dune, straining in the starlight to study the city. Much of it lay in ruins, but the roof still stood about one hundred yards ahead, including an area over a smaller pit where the caravaners were imprisoned. The shaky-looking scaffolding along the edge of the structure also remained in place.

“Where is he?” she whispered to Yurgen, although Sam knew only Linden could attest to his actual whereabouts. Gunfire in the city had lessened, but they needed the Mayor's chief emissary to free the caravaners, and give them an estimate of the damage and the dead—and the number of men they would now have to exterminate.