The Slayer (24 page)

Read The Slayer Online

Authors: Theresa Meyers

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Fantasy, #Romance, #Paranormal

He pulled her along up the steps and yanked open the door of the church. “In here!”
The dimly lit interior of the church was a world away from the noise and bustle of the city streets. The air was cool and scented with lingering traces of spicy incense and the heavy sweetness of beeswax candles.
The sound of his harsh breathing echoed off the stone walls, and he pressed his hand against the stitch in his side. While he was used to fighting hand-to-hand, he'd never been much of a runner. Alexa looked completely composed, save for the heightened color of her skin and the sparkle to her eyes.
“How did you know?” she asked, her voice low and quiet as befitted their location.
“You mean that you wouldn't burn up the minute you stepped on holy ground?”
She nodded.
“Your throne room is in an old church sanctuary, ain't it?”
She smiled at him, and the twinkle in her eyes intensified, nearly stealing away what little breath he had left. “You're far more observant and clever than you let on, aren't you?”
Winn tipped his hat at her. “Back home it's adapt or die.”
Alexa glanced past the font of holy water, through the double doors that led to the sanctuary. “European Hunters are far less observant. They won't think to look for us in here.”
“That's what I was counting on. We'll let them stew for an hour.”
“Frobisher is not going to be pleased with them.” She sounded delighted.
Winn smiled, although there was no humor in being pursued in a foreign city by determined soldiers. Deep down he felt bad, knowing they were fellow Hunters with a hell of a lot of pain coming their way, not because they were bad men, but because they had a bastard for a leader. “He don't look like the forgivin' sort.”
“He's not.”
“How do we get to those catacombs you were talking about?”
Alexa bit her lip and stared at the smooth stones on the floor, then tapped at her chin and frowned. “The closest entrance will be just south of
Barrière d'Enfer
, near the old city wall.”
He glanced cautiously out of the church doors, looking for any sign of the scarlet coats of the guards. “Looks like we're clear. Time's running out. Let's go.”
Alexa held out her hand and materialized a black parasol to help them better hide from detection out in the open. They stole quickly out of the church and down the residential section. Overhead the elegant little balconies were draped with pots of blooming lilies. They approached the entrance of the catacombs with caution. Winn kept glancing over their shoulders. There was no reason to draw attention to themselves or lead Frobisher's men directly to the catacombs if they could help it. Alexa stayed in the perpetual shade of her parasol and picked up her pace, her skirts swishing about her ankles while she approached a plain wrought iron door in the tan stone wall just south of the
Barrière d'Enfer
.
Winchester glanced at the unimposing door. It didn't look dangerous. But then looks could be deceiving. Evening shadows fell across the gate, making it appear more sinister. “Are you really going in there?”
Alexa pulled open the door and gave him an arch glance. “Do you have any better ideas for retrieving the piece of the Book?”
Winn scowled. He didn't like it. Going underground made him distinctly uncomfortable. Going underground into an ossuary filled with the bones of millions of the dead, well, that bordered on entering a casket of one's own. But neither could he stay near the door waiting and make them a target for Frobisher's men. Either way he'd be closer to a casket than he'd like.
The spiral staircase just inside the entrance circled downward like a drill bit into the rock for more than fifty feet before emptying out into a narrow tunnel almost the width of a grave for a man Winn's size. Smoking oil lamps periodically lit the way, casting pools of yellowish light. Wet gravel crunched beneath their feet and voices echoed in the tunnels ahead of them. Winn tensed. There was no way Frobisher's men could have made it there ahead of them unless they'd used another entrance. He slid his rifle from the long holster on his back. “Someone else is down here,” he muttered.
“Of course they are. It's considered a point of macabre fascination. People tour these tunnels all the time. Put that thing away before we scare an innocent.”
Winn grunted. “Don't mean they ain't dangerous.”
“All the better reason to find what we need and get out of here as soon as possible,” she retorted.
“What do you think she meant by the skull with tears of blood?” he muttered. “Bones don't bleed.”
“They could be paint, or they could be dried blood, or even a jewel fashioned like a tear.”
“Great. That narrows it down.”
After about sixty feet the tunnel opened up into a large room cut from the rock; its walls were crafted out of human remains. The bones, heaped in orderly, almost artful stacks, formed walls out of the rounded ends of long bones, punctuated in patterns here and there with rows of jawless skulls. It was both macabre and fascinating, and made him all too aware of his own fleeting mortality, but Winn didn't have time to stare. He was looking for the skull with the blood tears.
A chill swept through Winn that had nothing to do with the temperature of the catacombs. These had been people. Thousands, possibly millions of people at one time.
A metal gate, red with rust, shut off one of the darkened passages. “Do you think they will have hidden it behind one of these gates?”
“It's possible. The quarry tunnels run for miles.”
There were still faint echoes of other voices, but they grew dimmer as Winn and Alexa moved deeper into the catacombs, their lantern the only light. The dampness grew worse. A constant rain of water droplets dripped from the skull-infused ceiling. The bones had taken on a slick, glazed look from the coating of liquefied limestone. Starts of stalactites could be seen forming, like a twisted version of a cathedral ceiling with elegant points.
“Jumpin' Jehoshaphat. We ain't never going to find that skull down here,” he said as he gazed up at the skulls. “There's got to be a million people down here.”
“Six.”
“There're more than six people in here!”
“Six
million
, give or take a few. They emptied out all the cemeteries within the city for the last several centuries and brought the bones here.”
Winn pulled off his hat and swiped the back of his hand over his brow. The humid air saturated his shirt, making him sweat. “That old gypsy could have been a little more specific about her directions,” he muttered. They'd wasted an entire day traveling in the coach, and the gritty dryness in his eyes, despite the humidity of the tunnels, was from being bone weary. “We don't have time to play hide-and-seek. Frobisher's men are likely to show up any moment and Rathe's got every intention of beating us to the Gates and opening them.”
“But he can't without the pieces of the Book, nor can you close them without the pieces. Isn't that correct?”
“Partially. He'll find a way to open them with or without the Book. But what's in those pages is the only thing we can use to stop him.” Winn scanned every skull in the ceiling and those within the walls, searching for the elusive marker Mama Zinka had indicated.
The grit from above filtered down as a crack zigzagged through the damp stones in the vault above them with a scream-like noise that made the hair on the back of Winn's neck lift. “Move!” He grabbed her arm and began to run. Fetid water splashed up from the puddles beneath their feet, and Alexa stumbled trying to keep up, her sodden skirts tangling about her legs.
Crack!
A loud groan echoed from behind them. The stone vault gave way, the sand, soil, and stones from above sinking in to fill the narrow tunnel behind them, forcing them to rush forward.
They were trapped within the tunnel.
Chapter 19
Winchester frantically dug at the fallen stones blocking the tunnel with his fingers, nearly ripping his nails from their beds. Alexa knew panic when she saw it. He'd harm himself by trying to get out, when they needed to keep moving forward.
“It's no use,” Alexa said simply, trying to be the voice of calm and reason.
He glared at her, his skin paler and his lips taut beneath the dark edge of his mustache. “If you want to just clear off a place and lay yourself out and wait, that's fine, but I got no intention of staying in this crypt. I'll get out of this place if I have to chew my way out.”
She smothered a hopeless laugh.
“Something funny to you about all this?”
“Chew. Would you really even try that?”
Winn growled and dug harder at the stones.
“You're wasting time. We're better off trying to find another exit.”
He turned, his eyes narrowing. “Are there other exits?”
“There are all kinds of entrances to these catacombs. Some were sealed up long ago, but surely we can find something.”
“Without a map? You might as well try to navigate the Sonoran Desert by the cactus.”
She sighed. “Without proper tools we'll never get through that debris.” Alexa didn't remember much of how the catacombs wound their way through the earth, but she had enough sense of direction, even here beneath the surface, to know they needed to keep heading down the tunnel if they wanted to find an exit.
Winn swore under his breath, then spun on his heel and marched past her. “Well, come on, then. No use staying down here in these tunnels longer than we have to.”
The light from their torch flickered, drawing strange ghastly shapes on the uneven tunnel walls as they walked farther into the catacombs.
“Only thing worse than being under the ground is knowing you can't get out.”
Small, beady red eyes darted in the darkness, flashing as they reflected the torchlight. Rats. He hated the damn things. They were always in the horse or chicken feed. He muttered a few choice curses as he kept plodding forward.
“Winchester?” The tinny edge to her voice made him glance away from the small dots of color. “Are those rats?”
“Yep.”
Alexa skittered back a step. “Rats don't have red eyes.”
Winn paused only for a second. Damn. She was right. And there wasn't any squeaking. The click of a hundred little metal legs against the stone froze his blood.
“Mechanical spiders. Go! Go! Go!” Alexa grabbed up her skirts, and they sprinted down the dark passageway, taking whatever turns they could to lose the creatures.
The clicking sound grew fainter and fainter. Winn's lungs seared as he gasped in great draws of damp air. “I think we lost them.”
“For now.”
“I think we got less time than we'd thought to get the hell out of these catacombs.”
“Winchester, look!” The contessa pointed to one of the skulls lined up in a row in the bone wall behind them. Winn shifted the light from the torch, and the dark, blood-red stones, shaped like tears, sparkled on the skull's smooth off-white cheek.
“Look underneath it.”
She bent in half trying to peer beneath the jawless skull. “I can't see anything there.”
He moved beside her, bringing the torch closer. At this proximity Alexa could see the outline of his upper lip. The Hunter certainly knew how to kiss. The memory of their last kiss both fired and infuriated her. How could he so easily elicit passion from her when it was merely an exercise for him?
“There's nothing there.”
“Let me see.”
Alexa huffed. Why would he not believe her?
Winchester reached into the cavern of the skull's mouth, making it look like the skull was eating his hand. “There's a raised bit in here.” His voice shimmered with excitement. “Can you pull it?”
He grunted. His forearm bulged with the effort. “Nope.”
“Push it?”
He tried and shook his head.
“What about twisting it?”
“Like a knob?”
She nodded.
“My hand's too big.” He pulled his hand out from beneath the skull. Alexa didn't wait for an invitation; their time was growing absurdly short with each passing hour. “Move aside,” she ordered. If he didn't like it, that was unfortunate. She had been born to lead.
She slipped her hand into the opening and found the small circular piece that fit neatly in the palm of her hand. Twisting it like a knob on one of Sir Turlock's mechanical marvels, she heard the distinct click followed by the grinding movement of gears.
The wall of bones seemed to crack open and shift backward. The seams had been so well hidden by the edges of the bones, one could not see them until the wall was opened. A wash of cooler air, dry and stagnant, blew across them.
She stepped forward and was stopped by his grip on her upper arm. “Let me go first. If this was put in place by Hunters, it's likely booby-trapped.”
While the act of chivalry from an uncultured Slayer was commendable, Alexa still pulled her arm from his grasp, causing him to lock gazes with her. “After six hundred years, I think I know how to spot a Hunter's trap,” she said archly.
“Maybe you do. But maybe you don't know as much as you think you do.” The clicks were growing more rapid.
Winchester pulled her up hard against him, as an iron spike dropped down from the ceiling where she'd been standing. Alexa looked over her shoulder at the spike and shuddered. “Your point seems abundantly clear.”
He had the temerity to grin at her. “It's a good sign. Means we're getting close. Let's find out where they've hidden the piece of the Book.”
Alexa stayed right behind Winchester. They slowly skirted the piece of wall that had shifted inward. The light of the oil lamp flickered and swayed along the roughly hewn rock walls. This section still bore the marks of the ancient tools that had carved away the limestone from the quarry when she'd been but a girl.
A grinding sound startled both of them. The piece of wall began to shift back into place. “No!” Winn dropped the oil lamp. It shattered as he darted to the moving rock and tried to hold it back with his hands, to no avail.
Pitch darkness swallowed them whole.
The roar of his pulse kicked up another notch. Ever since they'd descended down the staircase, Alexa had tried without success to shut out the shushing sound of his blood, but the increasing tattoo of it made it almost impossible to ignore. She turned, glancing at him, able to see the ripple of heat coming off his skin, outlining his muscular form beneath his clothing. Being a vampire did have its advantages, but being able to see him clearly in the dark right now wasn't one of them. All it did was send her bloodlust to a dangerous tipping point.
“You're not scared of the dark, are you?”
“No.”
She thought about how he'd panicked in the casket while Boris had climbed the tree and she had transported when the werewolves had come barreling through the graveyard. Realization hit her. It wasn't the dark. It was the tight, confining space that triggered his deliciously rushing heartbeat.
“Just because it's dark doesn't mean this section isn't vast. It could go on for miles and miles,” she said, hoping to reassure him.
“Ain't going to help if we can't see it,” he ground out.
Alexa sighed and drew down into the center of her being just behind her solar plexus, pulling the energy together to manifest a new oil lamp. The weight of it settled firm and cool in her hand, and she lifted the glass to blow on the wick and light it.
The flicker of light grew and illuminated the sculpted planes of Winchester's face, pale and drawn. “All you had to do was ask,” she said, then handed him the lamp. “Is that such a hard thing?”
He blew out, making his mustache flicker with movement. “You have no idea.” Alexa's own lips began to tingle as she remembered just how his mouth felt slanted against hers.
Winchester held the lamp high, illuminating the tunnel. But the light only stretched so far, ending in a black, gaping maw ahead of them. “Well, we ain't getting out the way we came in.”
“If my sense of direction is correct, then this tunnel should lead us almost beneath the church of
Saint-Germain-des-Prés
,” she murmured, her voice echoing off the rough limestone walls.
There were no walls of stacked bones in this section of the catacombs. It had been intentionally sealed and protected by the ossuary. Surely this tunnel would lead them to where Mama Zinka claimed they'd find the missing piece of the Book of Legend.
They turned a corner and found the tunnel branched into three. “Which one do we take?” she asked.
Winchester searched the pale stone, looking for any clue they'd missed. Above each tunnel entrance, carved into the stone, was one of three small images. A lion's head, a palm tree, and a raven. The signs of the three brothers of the Legion of Hunters who'd hacked the Book apart in the first place: Cadel, Elwin, and Haydn.
“That way.” He pointed at the tunnel with the raven above it.
The contessa searched his face and glanced at each of the tunnels. “How can you tell?”
He pointed up at the insignias.
“Of course. Haydn. He brought our piece of the Book to the Byzantine Empire.”
Winn stopped in his tracks and stared hard at her. “
Our
piece?”
She frowned, putting her hands on her hips. “Well, we have been guarding it for six hundred years. So, yes, I've come to think of it as ours.”
“It belongs to the Legion.”
“It belongs to whoever can keep hold of it,” she challenged.
He stiffened and rolled his shoulders back. “You know I'm going to take it back with me.”
“Of course. And then you'll return it, as you promised His Imperial Majesty.”
Winn gave a harsh, grating laugh. “That's if I survive.”
“What do you mean?”
“I ain't stupid, sweetheart. When you spouted off that prophecy I noticed that the Chosen don't all survive. If that's part of the deal, then I'll go along with it, but it's going to be me who takes the fall, not one of my little brothers.”
Her lips thinned, as if she wanted to say something but purposely held it back.
The internal clock in Winchester's head still ticked away the minutes. Their time to find the Book and return with it grew shorter and shorter. He grabbed hold of her bare hand, instantly aware of the spark that arced between them when skin touched skin. “Come on, we've got to find that piece of the Book and a way out of here.”
They tramped down the darkened tunnel, aware of the steady plink and plunk of water that dripped down through the limestone. No wonder the catacombs were unstable, Winn thought. The ground above them was being held up by a sponge of rock that was growing more porous and flimsy all the time, and whole sections of Paris blithely went about their business completely unaware they could sink to their deaths if the ground collapsed beneath them.
Without warning the tunnel abruptly ended at a locked and rusted iron gate. Winn lifted his lamp to get some kind of view of what lay on the other side and found himself staring at a stone sarcophagus. It was like being in the tomb of an ancient Egyptian pharaoh. Those ambrotypes of his friend Marcus's explorations and digs in search of errant mummies would have come in handy about now.
Winn rattled the gate, getting a fine powdery coating of red rust on his hands and down the front of his black pants for his trouble. “We've got to get this gate open.”
“All you had to do was ask.” Alexa evaporated in a swirl of smoke-like particles and appeared on the other side of the iron bars. She tinkered with the complicated latch on the other side of the door. Her brow furrowed. “It's stuck. We need something that can break it loose.”

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