Ruth had vanished as soon as we travelled through the passage and climbed up into the chapel. We were to guard Gray, Constance and Kara when they emerged from the tunnel, but she hadn’t bothered to stay and help us. Who knew what her game was?
A dozen or more Saviours had been combing the hills since we’d entered the chapel. We’d taken turns watching them. They couldn’t see us behind the thick stone walls with their infra-red viewers, but they could see a human face peering through the glass-less chapel windows, so we had to be quick.
A swift change came when all of a sudden they were running and shouting. I knew then that they’d been radioed about Gray and Sethi. About the plan.
Sethi, Gray and Kara must have made it to the remembrance hall.
What happened? Did the plan work? Did they get out?
Some of the Saviours had run towards the chapel—no doubt rushing to get to the cellar to check that their precious collection of lambs was still chained and ready for slaughter.
Richard held up a hand to us, letting the Saviours come closer. Closer. Closer.
My heart jerked against my chest wall.
Richard, Cormack and Yolanda jumped up with their guns—the semi-automatics that we’d taken from the supply room.
A terrifying back and forth of gunfire rattled the air, louder than anything I’d ever heard before.
Like a war.
It was a war.
We’d reached a place of savagery and entered it. It was fight or die.
Bits of sandstone flew across the small space, shattered by the Saviours’ guns. But so far we were all alive. We were partly protected by the chapel walls, and we’d had the element of surprise in our favour.
Then, quiet.
I stole a quick look past Yolanda. Men and women had dropped dead on the rocky ground, the rest fleeing.
I turned to Richard. He shot me a tense grin. “Got them on the run.”
At that moment came a sound like the earth splitting apart. A roar from hell itself.
Sethi had done it. The mine was detonating.
Columns of water thundered through the centre of the monastery, seeming as high and wide as a skyscraper, stone blocks flying into the night air.
Pieces of the monastery smashed repeatedly into the chapel, tremors running beneath our feet.
“Get out of here!” Cormack’s eyes were wild in the thin, dark light.
Arms over our heads, we headed to the doorway.
Gray, make it out of there.
Please.
I hung back, the last to leave.
Richard spun around, grabbing my arm. “Don’t stop now.”
We both turned around to the monastery then, stunned by the sight of the immense water spout plunging back to earth and the buildings beginning to collapse and sink.
Gray, where are you?
Where are you?
You promised . . .
80. Constance
OUR URGENT SCREAMS AND SHOUTS ECHOED in the narrow tunnel.
My last thought before the explosion was of Kara.
Far behind us came the roar of the world breaking and the glass windows of the cenote shattering.
A mass of water and glass was headed our way. The door wouldn’t hold it back.
The ground swayed and pitched dangerously.
Kara ran faster than I could, forcing me along, breath raw in my chest.
The maelstrom surged behind us. I could hear it filling the tunnel.
Oh God.
Light.
Sky.
The exit.
The chapel was gone. Just rubble.
I heard Gray’s anguished cry.
Were Evie and the others trapped under all that?
If they were, they were dead. All dead.
We climbed out and over the stone blocks and remains of the chapel.
An ear-splitting sound boomed—the rubble tumbling beneath our feet and then dropping.
We were sent downward, on top of what used to be the roof of the chapel. In terror, I jerked my head around. The ground had formed a pit about ten feet deep, and it was still dropping.
“Get out of here!” Jennifer screamed.
The sides of the pit were tumbling, while the ground below us sank farther and farther.
As we tried to climb the steep sides, torrents of dark seawater burst from the tunnel, pushing us down, drowning us.
I fought my way to the surface. “Kara! Kara!”
Gray and Jennifer surfaced just after me, coughing and spluttering, bright red blood seeping from cuts and slashes in their skin.
Glass. Swirling around and around us.
I glanced down at my arms—they were covered in blood.
Stone continued to fall in from the sides of the pit. The ground could continue to cave in, with the rubble above falling onto us, sealing us in.
“Kara!” I swam frantically, needing to get to her.