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by Judith Reeves-Stevens

  She blinked. “A long time . . . Millions . . .”

  “And lookit here!” Ironwood hooted with delight. “The artist signed his work!” His flashlight took aim at a section of the map beneath the ice-free Antarctic islands.

  David’s and Jess’s flashlights followed suit to discover that the artist who had created the map had signed it as artists in ages past often did. By placing his hand, or her hand, against the wall and blowing pigment over it, creating a shadow of that hand—the hand of the maker.

  A thumb and three long webbed fingers, all with talons, inhumanly splayed from top to bottom, forming a silhouette like that of a bladed cross . . .

  Ironwood’s joyful laughter filled the chamber.

  Then the ground shook. The bombing had begun.

  FIFTY-SEVEN

  It was 4:00 A.M., and Jack Lyle was on the ground, Roz cradled at his side, in the lee of a rocky outcropping about a mile from the opening to the underground site. He was watching the thin line of low clouds on the far horizon that glowed with the approach of dawn. The sun would bring the bombers.

  Lyle knew they’d have to leave the sheltering hollow soon, but he needed to rest a few minutes before carrying Roz again. For now, his partner was swaddled in thermal blankets, warmed by chemical heating packs. Her color was back. Her attention wasn’t—muddled by morphine.

  She opened a bleary eye, unfocused. “Let’s never do that again, okay?”

  “Do what?”

  “Road trip.”

  Lyle squeezed her gloved hand lightly, reasoning it might not be so wrong to finally step out of the chain of command, wishing he’d done so long ago. “Never again,” he promised. Then something in the air changed. A vibration?

  Aircraft. The whine of approaching jets. From the north.

  Lyle edged over the rise of loose black rocks to scan the night sky.

  Deep indigo, stars still visible. No aircraft lights. The planes were running dark.

  Then the whine of engines became a roar, and sudden, silent fireballs erupted across the rocky terrain. A moment later, the dull crack and the thundering rumble of the bombs’ explosions shook the ground.

  The Argentines . . .

  They’d advanced their attack by at least an hour, but, since they were flying under night conditions, Lyle knew their targeting would not be precise. This far south, the Global Positioning Satellite system wasn’t always reliable—fewer satellites were overhead at any one time. He thought of the narrow passageways of the underground site. The loose debris around its opening. The only chance MacClary, Weir, and Ironwood had of escaping was if they were already on their way. As the light improved, so would the bombers’ aim. One direct hit on the point of entry would be enough to seal it. It could never be reopened in time to save anyone left below.

  “Hey, boss . . . what’s happening?”

  Roz was fumbling at her thermal blankets, trying to unwrap them so she could stand. He slid back and pushed her down just as more flashes in the distance lit up dark skies. With more explosive concussions, new bombs struck the land around them.

  “Roz, listen to me. I have to go back to where we landed. I have to find one of the radios, let Command know what’s happening. The helos from the Roosevelt will be too late.”

  Roz tried to stand again. “I’ll go—”

  “No. You have to stay here.” More explosions. A small stream of stones poured down the sloping rock to pile beside her. “And you have to stay down. I’ll come back as soon as I can.”

  Roz’s eyes met his and, for a moment, cleared. “Promise,” she said.

  Lyle wouldn’t lie to her, said nothing. He ran as fast as he could into the strike zone.

  “Dave! We have to go! Those fools are bombing us!”

  Ironwood was squeezing his bulk through the two huge metal doors guarding the enormous chamber, one arm carefully shielding five gold books he’d pulled at random from the tiered stand inside.

  “Almost!” David called back. He was taking flash photo after flash photo of the encircling map. The ground shook again. Rocks fell from the chamber’s ceiling to clatter on the floor. “Damn! Memory’s full!” He whirled about and raced for the doors, shoving the camera into an inner pocket of his open parka.

  “I got maybe half the map,” he said to Jess.

  Ironwood blinked rapidly as distant blasts echoed in the cavern beyond the doors. “What about the signature? You got that, right?”

  “I think so. I—”

  The harsh squeal of metal grinding on stone obliterated David’s words as one of the entrance doors toppled inward, trapping Ironwood. He lost his breath explosively. “One of those braziers,” he gasped, “fell over, hit the door . . .”

  David and Jess were already straining to push the door away from him. Wedged in the opening, Ironwood leaned back against the heavy metal panel, using his broad shoulders for added leverage . . . pushing . . . pushing . . . then, suddenly, he was free as the door shifted to the side. He fell into the cavern on the other side, his hands stretched out to brace himself, the precious gold books scattering.

  Jess and David were right behind him.

  Breathing heavily, Ironwood was already scooping up his books, shooting apprehensive glances at the cavern’s ceiling forty feet overhead as an enormous crash resounded from the chamber they’d just escaped—more of it was breaking apart.

  “This cavern’s a natural formation,” Jess said. They ran for the only exit: the stone tower staircase leading up to the passageways above. “No stones to come loose.”

  Their bulky cold-weather gear made them awkward, and their pace was more like double-time marching than true running. Their flashlight beams lit the way.

  Halfway to the tower, more explosive rumbles thundered and the ground trembled. Still, as Jess had told them, the cavern ceiling held.

  The tower, though, was not a natural formation. When they neared it, less than fifty feet away, the first of its outer stones dislodged with a groan and tumbled heavily to the cavern floor, where the thud of their impact raised a cloud of dust.

  The three runners stopped. Their flashlight beams probed the tower. It was still intact—but for how long?

  Ironwood was wheezing, struggling to catch his breath.

  “The explosions—they’re coming in waves about every sixty seconds,” David said.

  Jess and Ironwood understood.

  “Get ready . . .” David said. “Get ready . . .”

  Four concussions, in the air and through the ground. The terrible, grating sound of more stone blocks being pushed out, cascading from the tower’s side to strike the cavern’s floor.

  “Sixty seconds—go!” They rushed for the tower’s doorway before the next bombs fell.

  Even through the protective layers of his balaclava, his helmet, and the hood of his borrowed parka, Lyle’s ears rang with the thunderclaps of each detonation.

  Debris rained down as he pushed himself back to his feet, ready to continue his sprint until the next bombing run, back to the point of entry. He’d seen bodies near it when he’d brought Roz to the surface, even took a parka from one. He’d checked for survivors among the commandos, but there were none. No sign of the enemy combatants, either. He’d found a medic’s pack and made the split-second decision to treat Roz and get her a safe distance away before searching for a radio. That was when he thought he still had more than an hour before the attack would begin.

  The roar of engines grew again, and black shadows screamed across the sky. Lyle dropped for cover.

  At least now the growing light of day was enough that he could identify the attackers. Lyle didn’t need to see specific markings to know they were the Argentines’ French-built Mirage 5s. Each could carry more than eight thousand pounds of ordnance, including two air-to-ground missiles and rapid-fire cannons. Even if anyone did escape the structure below, once the sun was up they’d be easy targets.

  The next cluster of bombs was closer to the entry point.

  Th
ree more waves, and it would be over.

  Lyle was on his feet and running.

  Jess was faster and led the way. By the time she reached the upper third of the spiral staircase, she couldn’t separate the thunder of their footsteps from the thunder of explosions.

  Until she stopped abruptly and David slammed into her as the wall of the tower fell away, exposing the last few steps above her, leaving the staircase partially unsupported. A moment later, Ironwood reached them, puffing heavily. His flashlight beam joined theirs, shooting off into nothingness, catching only swirls of dust.

  The final rumble of the explosions faded. “That’s the last for this wave,” David said. “Let’s go!”

  Ten steps to go. Jess put a foot on the next one, testing it before committing her full weight, then the next ones.

  Five steps left. Jess slipped her flashlight into her parka and lifted both hands to grip the edge of the stone floor above her head. She pulled herself back into the round chamber they’d descended from. “Clear!” she called out.

  Five steps from the top of the spiral staircase, David passed his flashlight to her, then took her outstretched hand and was up beside her.

  Jess shone her flashlight into the opening as he called “Clear!” to Ironwood.

  Five steps below, Ironwood handed up his books and flashlight, then placed both hands on the opening’s edge to brace himself. He sighed, pulled back. “That’s not going to work.” He moved up another step. Then another. One more and he was able to put his hands on the edge again and hoist himself up until one knee was half on the chamber floor.

  Then the next wave of explosions started and the staircase swayed, collapsing.

  Ironwood’s knee slipped, and he dropped with a grunt of shock, hands still gripping the cut stone of the opening.

  Jess and David dropped their flashlights and each grabbed an arm and pulled on it to haul him back to safety. The big man’s thick parka bunched against the opening’s edge, making it even harder to draw him up. Caught in the crisscrossed beams of the flashlights on the upper floor, billows of dust from the fallen tower roiled up past Ironwood. Everyone began to cough.

  “Swing your legs!” Jess strained to position her boots flat on the floor so they wouldn’t slip. Ironwood swung himself side to side, but the closer his right boot came to hooking onto the edge of the floor, the more his arms slipped in Jess’s and David’s hands.

  Another wave of bombs struck. The sound of falling stones from the passageways beyond the chamber escalated, the noise like a stampede of something wild about to overrun them.

  David told Ironwood to start swinging his legs again, and this time do it as if he meant it!

  Ironwood’s answering grunt became a hacking cough, but he kicked his right leg higher, higher. David released his grip on Ironwood’s arm and lunged, caught hold.

  Ten seconds later, Ironwood was on the floor, wheezing, exhilarated by his close escape. “That was almost worth going to prison—almost.”

  Ten seconds more and Jess had them on their feet as the ripple of destruction spread and the underground site approached extinction.

  As they rounded the corner by the first mural they’d discovered, David shone his flashlight ahead. Through a haze of dust he saw the rubble they’d landed on when they’d dropped down from the surface. The mound was larger now, and growing. More debris was falling from above.

  Fifteen feet between the top of the mound and the crevasse opening overhead, thin rays of daylight spiked through. In that light, he saw—

  “The rope’s still there!”

  They rushed for the pile of rocks and stones, scrambling up its sloping sides, sliding down two feet for every three gained. Just as they made the top and Jess grabbed the rope to pull on it, a blinding flash of light blazed down, accompanied by a deafening crash and a hail of rocks that struck them like a shotgun blast.

  It was a minute, and another wave of bombs, farther off this time, before David’s hearing recovered sufficiently that he heard Ironwood’s labored coughing, his breath almost whistling. But David’s first thought was for the rope. If it had been lost in that blast . . .

  Jess had it. She’d wrapped it around her forearm and was testing it to see if it would hold her weight. It did.

  David steadied the rope as Jess began to climb, hand over hand, upward, to the patch of sky.

  “I surely can’t make that climb, Dave.” Ironwood stared up as they both watched Jess reach the surface, crawl out, and turn to shout for David to follow her.

  “You don’t have to.” David released his grip on the rope and shucked off his gloves. “The agents lowered you down, we’ll pull you up.”

  “Good man.” Ironwood gripped his shoulder. “You remember what I told you we were going to do, the two of us, way back in that hotel?”

  David did. “We’re going to turn this world upside down.”

  “So what are you waiting for? Climb!”

  David reached the top and swung his body out of the opening. His lungs had only an instant to register the burning change from cold to freezing air before he and Jess flattened to the ground as jets flashed by and the air shuddered with more explosions over a nearby ridge.

  Jess’s eyes were bright with unshed tears and despair. “They’re bombing everything. There won’t be a thing left down there. After all this time—”

  David reached for her hand to comfort her. “We’ve got pictures, and Ironwood has books. This time there’s evidence.”

  Jess was inconsolable. “It’s not enough. It was the First Gods’ temple.” She twisted around to call down to Ironwood, jerked the rope to signal him. “Ready?”

  His voice echoed back, unintelligible.

  David peered down to see Ironwood kneeling on the mound of rocks, his parka off. “What’re you doing?”

  “The books go first.” Ironwood stuffed the books into his parka and tied the makeshift bundle to the end of the rope. He gave Jess a thumbs-up. She hauled the parka to the surface and untied it quickly.

  “Okay,” David shouted down. “You’re next.”

  He threw back the rope as the roar of approaching jets shook the surrounding rock. “Grab it!” David shouted.

  But Ironwood cupped his hands to his mouth and called up as if he already knew what was about to happen.

  “Tell them, David! Change the world!”

  Then the next bomb hit and sound ceased to be sound and became something physical.

  The impact slammed David and Jess back against the slope of hard rock and ice, and in a final, endless moment, David watched the ground around the opening shift, and then with terrifying speed it was sucked down, erasing all traces of the opening.

  And all traces of Ironwood.

  FIFTY-EIGHT

  One after another, three jets streaked past, so low to the ground David could feel their wake, taste their fumes. Stung by flying rocks, he staggered across the unyielding terrain, disoriented by the blinding light and deafening noise, yet somehow beyond the hurt of cold or injury and the dreadful, senseless loss of Ironwood. All that mattered now was the camera’s precious records. Ironwood’s five gold books. And Jess.

  She dragged him down one slope as bomb after bomb exploded close behind them. At the bottom of that slide, a large white rock stood up and ran for them.

  It was Agent Lyle. He had a radio in one hand, and he dove at them both to force them down as a line of small explosions stitched the ground beside them.

  “They’ve seen us!” he shouted. “Get to cover!” He pointed to a tall pile of rocks that offered protection on two sides, and they ran to it.

  “Where’s Ironwood?” Lyle asked. Jess shook her head. The agent’s attention immediately turned back to the sky.

  “Not good,” he said.

  Distant jets were banking, turning, coming back.

  “This way.” Lyle got to his feet and led them running past the rocks and—

  Another jet. On approach from the opposite direction.

>   Lyle yelled, “Scatter!”

  Then the sky exploded—not the ground.

  What had once been a jet became a madly spinning fireball cartwheeling past them, spewing thick black smoke and flaming wreckage.

  There was a second explosion. This time behind them. The death spiral of the second jet.

  The air above them thundered as three more jets shot by.

  This time, Lyle was on his feet and waving, shouting.

  “Raptors! They’re on our side!”

  Later, in the protected hollow where Roz Marano dozed in thermal blankets, Lyle set up an emergency shelter from the commandos’ supplies, cracked the chemical packs to heat their rations, and listened to the reassuring words of the captain of the Roosevelt, now less than a day away. Later, Jessica MacClary and David Weir showed him what had cost Ironwood his life.

  Weir had carefully removed five small objects from his parka and set them on a blanket. They were books of gold. An embossed cross marked the top sheet of all but one book. That book bore the image of a face.

  Lyle looked at Weir, then back to the book. “Huh,” he said. “That almost looks like you.” Then he looked at Jessica MacClary with even more interest, because his observation had caused her to put a hand on Weir’s arm. A protective gesture.

  “You’re not going to believe what we found down there,” David said.

  Lyle looked again from David to the book.

  “Probably not,” he agreed, “but Roz will.”

  FIFTY-NINE

  Deep in the cavern near the Colorado River, twelve women gathered, because that was the number the Talking God and the House God required to pray at the tsenadjihih. It was an ancient shrine, a table made of stone, three feet high, eight feet wide, and holding the Spider Woman’s gifts. It had been moved many times for safety through the years, and now a wide, round kiva had been built around it, for protection. Coleman lamps lit the inside.

  Each woman placed her hands on the object before her, each object cradled by a hollow indentation in the table, each object different, old and revered and many times repaired, and they chanted their prayer for good fortune on their journey.