“Onward.” Drake set off quickly in the direction of Diamond Head. “Stay alert. We’re getting close.”
The passageway began to slope down. Drake wondered for a moment how a lava tube might incline against the natural flow, but then realized the magma itself would shoot through the path of least resistance with hellish force behind it. The lava would take whatever angle it wished.
A few minutes more and Drake stopped again. There was another hole in the floor ahead, this time, smaller and perfectly rounded. When Komodo dropped the glow stick they guessed the shaft to be about thirty feet deep.
“More dangerous,” Drake said. “Take care you two.”
Then he noticed that the glow stick’s light wasn’t being reflected by any rock walls. Its orangey light was eaten up by the surrounding dark. Below them was a large chamber.
He signaled for quiet. As one, they all listened intently for any kind of sounds echoing up from below. After a minute of utter silence, Drake took hold of the drop-rope and swung out over the empty shaft. Quickly, he slid down its length until he emerged under the ceiling.
Still no noise. He snapped half a dozen more glow sticks and threw them into the chamber below. Gradually, the unnatural light began to bloom.
And Matt Drake finally beheld that which few men before him had ever seen. A large, rectangular room about fifty meters long. A perfectly smooth floor. Three curved walls etched with some kind of ancient markings, indistinguishable at this distance.
And dominating one wall — the curved archway that had so fascinated Captain Cook. The doorway inside it that so obsessed the Blood King. And the terrors and wonders that might lie beyond that filled Matt Drake and his companions with so much dread.
They had found the Gates of Hell.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Hayden held on tight as the chopper banked through the sky in a rapid change of course. Her last view of Kinimaka had been of him being goosed onto another chopper by the ever-playful Alicia Myles. The sight made her wince, but the practical side of her knew that when it came to battle, Mano had some of the best back-up in the business in the form of the crazy Englishwoman.
As did Hayden. Mai sat beside her, quiet and reposed, as if they were heading over to the Napali Coast for a bit of world-class sightseeing. Crack troops filled the rest of the seats. Kauai was about twenty minutes out. Gates had just contacted her to say there had been a terrorist attack at the open-air Kukui Grove shopping center on Kauai. A man had chained himself to a railing outside the joint Jamba Juice/Starbucks unit on the north side of the complex. Someone with wads and wads of cemtex strapped to his body and a finger on the trigger of a crude detonator.
The man also toted two automatic weapons and a Bluetooth earpiece, and he wouldn’t allow any of the restaurant’s patrons to go free.
In Gates’s own words. “The dickhead’s clearly going to hold out there as long as he can, then when the authorities make their move, he’ll detonate. A large part of the Kauai police force have been diverted to the scene, and away from you.”
“We’ll secure the ranch, sir,” Hayden assured him. “We expected this.”
“That we did, Miss Jaye. I guess we’ll see what Kovalenko’s plans are for the Big Island next.”
Hayden closed her eyes. Kovelenko had been planning this assault for years, but questions remained. Why abandon the portal device? Why go out with such a bang? Could it be his Plan B? That, with all his efforts being rapidly exposed by the authorities and the instigation of his Blood Vendetta against Drake and his friends and families, he had chosen this route to gain the most notoriety.
Or, she thought, he might be using the old, old strategy — create a big enough bang over here, that your deeds might go unnoticed over there.
Never mind, she thought. Her mind was on Ben and the dangerous task he was undertaking. She would never say it on duty, but she was growing to love him dearly. The duty she felt to her father had not faded, but it had become less imperative with the terrible death of Kennedy Moore. Real life trumped old promises any day.
As the chopper swooped through the bright blue Hawaiian skies, Hayden offered up a prayer for Ben Blake.
Then her cell phone began to ring. When she glanced at the screen, her eyebrows shot up in surprise.
“Hi,” she answered immediately. “How’ve you been?”
“Most excellent, thank you, but this tomb exploration business has one serious side-effect. My tan has almost faded away.”
Hayden smiled. “Well, Torsten, there are salons for that sort of thing.”
“Between the command post and the tomb? Not really.”
“I’d sure love to chat, Torsten, but you Swede’s do pick your moments.”
“Understood. I tried Drake first but went straight to voicemail. Is he okay?”
“Better than he was, yes.” Hayden saw the shape of Kauai looming off to the right. “Listen—”
“I’ll be quick. The op was proceeding well here. Nothing untoward. All as expected and in a timely manner. But…” Torsten paused and Hayden heard him draw breath. “Something happened today. I would say something feels ‘off.’ You American’s might term it differently.”
“Yes?”
“I received a call from my government. From my go-between to the Statsminister. A high-level call. I—” Another hesitant pause, most unlike Dahl.
The jagged Kauai coast swept past below them. The call came over the radio. “Eight minutes to target.”
“I was told that our operation — our Scandinavian operation was about to be taken over by a new agency. A joint task force made up of high-level, but unnamed, members of the American CIA, the DIA and the NSA. Now, Hayden, I’m a soldier and I’ll follow a command from my highest superior, but does that sound right to you?”
Hayden was shocked despite herself. “It sounds like bullshit to me. What’s the name of the man in charge? The one you will hand over to.”
“Russell Cayman. Do you know him?”
Hayden searched her memory. “I know the name, but I know very little about him. I’m sure he’s DIA, Defense Intelligence Agency, but they mainly look after weapon systems acquisition. What on earth would this Russell Cayman want from you and the Tomb?”
“You read my mind.”
From the corner of her eye, Hayden saw Mai’s head snap around as if she’d been shot through the skull. But when Hayden turned questioningly toward her the Japanese agent looked away.
Hayden thought for a few seconds and then asked in a quiet voice, “Do you trust all your men, Torsten?”
Dahl’s overlong pause answered her question.
“If the DIA have been tipped off about something, then they have a very long reach. Their priority might even exceed the CIA’s. Tread softly, buddy. This guy, Cayman, he’s nothing short of a ghost. A troubleshooter for black ops, Gitmo, 9/11. If something huge and sensitive goes wrong, he’s the sort of man you turn to.”
“Fuck me. I wish I hadn’t asked.”
“I have to go now, Torsten. But I promise you I’ll speak to Jonathan about this bullshit as soon as I can. Hang in there.”
Torsten signed off with the world-weary sigh of a professional soldier who had already seen it all and was loathe to be assigned as some lackey to an American upstart. Hayden felt for him. She turned to Mai, about to ask what she knew.
But the call came over the radio, “Target.”
Ahead and below the fields were burning. As the chopper swept lower, tiny figures could be seen running haphazardly in every direction. Ropes deployed from the cabin and men leapt for them, slithering quickly to the blasted landscape below. Hayden and Mai awaited their turn, Mai’s expression blank, as they heard their own men open fire.