They were in a straight section, and Ishi’s torch had picked out another door, and the uneven lines of a rock fall scattered around a man’s body. Lyle.
“The rats have teeth,” Prince Gustav said, as they moved quickly to uncover the fallen Alban. Beyond the door was a clanging, mechanical digging noise.
“Heartbeat is strong,” Rian said, then winced as the Swedish prince employed some rough-and-ready methods to encourage Lyle to consciousness.
“…Highness?”
“Today I am the aide, yes?” Gustav said, with a note of genuine relief. “You make the bad show, Lyle. It is a poor warrior that adventures without weapons.”
“Lynsey had—Lynsey!” Lyle attempted to bolt upright, and reeled.
“She’s alive,” Rian said quickly. “Evelyn’s taking care of her.”
Further discussion was forestalled by additional banging, as if a horse was trying to kick down a stable door.
“Is it that they run?” Prince Gustav wondered.
“What happened, Lyle?” Rian asked. “How did you end up here?”
Lyle was holding his head, investigating lumps, and spoke haltingly.
“There was something I guessed…but you must know it, if you’ve been through that first room. I wanted to check the tombs…the tombs for any sign of damage, so we took a tour, and dropped off the back. We found one that looked freshly painted…didn’t make sense. Then a piece of the paving lifted up. Did they know the timing of the…? We hid, and watched as they worked on the freshly-painted tomb, making the inscription look older. Then…”
He trailed off, face creased with confusion, and then flinched as another round of banging came from beyond the door.
“Why did we follow them? We must have followed. We were—I remember standing outside that room’s entrance, watching them. They were making preparations to seal tunnels, to fully erase any sign that they had ever been—ever been… Did someone come up behind us?”
He stopped, bewildered.
“Enough for you this day, my Alban,” Prince Gustav said. “There are no bones broken, yes? The Keeper, she will lend you a shoulder.”
“There’s at least eight people in there,” Rian said, since the prince was clearly contemplating going through the door. “And…I’m not sure it’s them making that noise. We can’t be sure it’s the Huntresses that killed those people.”
“It is the stomach of milk that would not find out!” Gustav said cheerfully, and bent to help Lyle up, and out of the way.
“Your Highness,” Lyle said, clearly horrified. “The risk…”
But axe haft was already meeting door, and Rian decided she would really rather not see what the thing would do to people.
“Let’s get you out of here, Lyle.”
“Do you know what the Swedes will do to Alba if he gets himself killed?” Lyle staggered toward Gustav.
Rian rather thought Sweden would exact a blood price and send a new Lord Protector, but forbore to comment, moving to join the Alban man as he followed Gustav through the door.
Beyond was a siege.
A makeshift barrier, a jumbled combination of mining spoil and metal plates, sectioned off part of the room. In the very corner an upward ramp had been cut into the wall, and two men using noisy machines were breaking into a wall of stone blocks exposed near the ceiling, while most of the remaining Romans struggled to ward off a now-familiar hulking creature.
The bull-bear was smeared with dirt and covered in gashes. From the condition of the rest of the room, it looked as if the creature, like Lyle, had been brought down by a rock fall, though one that had involved collapsing an entire tunnel. Perhaps the Romans had believed themselves safe from it, and turned their attention to opening an escape route until it had dug its way free.
Gustav, of course, bounded directly for the thing, and it turned to throw itself at him. The Swedish prince met the bull-bear’s attack with competence, if not ease, while his driver drew a gun of his own, and circled so that he had a clear shot if it became necessary.
The Romans’ response to sudden assistance was to redouble their efforts to break through the wall above. As they moved, Rian stiffened, spotting two people she had missed at first glance because they were kneeling on the floor. A middle-aged woman and an older man, hands pressed together, lips moving in silent chant. Strangers to her, but familiar thanks to Eleri’s precise sketchwork. The Mendacii.
Obvious what they were doing. The most logical response to a god-touched creature like the bull-bear was a god-touched counter. And the thing that had chased the children had been monstrously powerful.
Rian shot the man first. She had a good angle on him, and the bullet struck him in the temple, but the woman flinched away as he fell, and Rian’s second bullet pinged off the far wall.
And she had acted too late. The whispers came from every corner, words not quite strong enough to be audible, skittering around the cramped room. Rian’s spine crawled, and she moved to try for a clearer line of sight, but the Romans were using their barrier to block her now, and she had to dash quickly for an overturned table when two produced guns, and fired back.
Lyle gasped, and she thought that he’d been hit, but it was worse. Greenish-grey hands had reached up from the uneven floor, and were pulling him down. Before Rian even understood what was happening, he had vanished to his knees.
“Ishi!” Prince Gustav shouted imperatively, landing a creditable blow on the bull-bear.
Gustav’s driver had already acted, joining Rian’s attempt to bring down the shooters, or the remaining Mendacium. Rian took the chance and grabbed Lyle’s hand, then dragged the fallen table to him, as if it was a life buoy that might keep him afloat. He had sunk to his waist, and Rian struggled to hold him without coming into contact with the reaching spectral hands. Her efforts seemed to make no difference.
“Arianne, I…” Lyle’s eyes were wide, his panic and horror beating at her.
But then that blast of emotion calmed, his features firmed, and, gaze fixed on her…he pulled her toward him.
THIRTY
Rian gasped, and flung herself away, a chill finger brushing her arm. A more natural hand caught her ankle, and Lyle’s smile was quietly pleased as he vanished underneath a clutching grey-green tide, pulling Rian behind him.
She kicked, and caught at the shielding table, but the power of the thing was beyond human strength. The hands were icy, and it felt like they were dragging her into ancient, wet mud, the kind that sent a knife of chill straight to the bone.
Twisting, she tried to spot the remaining Mendacium. No sign, so she snapped off two shots at one of the Romans she could see, grazing his shoulder. But no, she had to conserve her bullets. Somehow choke the horror down, and work for a chance, and that was not a thing that was easy to do when bitter hands clutched at her thighs. How many bullets did she have left? And why, why had Lyle—?
Rian pushed that question away. Why did not matter at this moment. Only a woman, over there behind the barrier. A woman who had called death, and whom Rian must answer with death. The Mendacium had been kneeling, and that one man was in the way, and that at least was an easy shot, and Rian took it.
There. The proudly handsome face, in profile, barely visible through a gap in the barrier. How many bullets left? One? Or was it none? Again, that was not a thing to think about, not yet, because cold hands had Rian’s waist, and her grip on the table was making little difference, and this was as difficult a shot as Rian had ever tried, after years of training diligently because a Prytennian woman travelling took care to be prepared.