Rick raised his crowbar back and high over his head. With a grunt, he brought it down, ramming it into the crack between the doors. The blow hit true with a shattering, splintering crash. A fracture opened in the narrow space between the doors. He reared back and brought the crowbar down again. The wood snapped and broke. Multiple fissures ruptured through the wood. Only blackness was visible beyond. The third blow created a crevice big enough for a dog to wriggle through.
FireWind gathered himself to leap through. Stopped. Backed away two steps.
From inside the doors, a weak moan rose.
Soft weeping.
The words, “Nononononono.”
I knew those sounds. They were the sounds of children in terror.
Church children. Zeb. My brother.
NINETEEN
FireWind tapped his front paw four times and whuffed-growled.
I said, “I count four voices. Two are little children. Toddlers. No church children that age are missing. There’s something…I don’t know. Wrong. Not real? Aya?”
He tilted his head one way and then another, his ears moving all around, catching the sounds from the tunnel. Occam, at my side, leaned forward, his shoulders high, catlike, and the other werecats followed suit.
Occam asked, “Is it a recording? Like in the house where we found the body?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. But it feels wrong,” I said, this time not making it a question. “Maybe something faking being children to pull us in.”
“Null sticks,” Rick ordered. “One in your off hand.”
My off hand held the flashlight, but I could make do. I tucked the metal stick into my jacket sleeve and rolled the cuff to hold the stick in place. From the cave came increasing screams of pain and terror, but…I had heard real pain and terror. This was off.
“No gasping,” I said, figuring out what was missing. “The breath is all wrong.”
“Ingram,” LaFleur said. “Shine your light in. Kent. Throw in anilluminationworking amulet as soon as you can see how far back the light goes.”
Lainie blew out an exasperated breath and dug into a small gobag at her waist. “I don’t know why you always expect me to have every kind of working amulet on me. Sir.”
“Because you are exceptional at your job, Lainie,” he said with a faint smile, “if a bit snarky.”
FireWind, who liked more formal communications and no chitchat on an op, snapped at the air.
While they talked, I eased to the broken doors and shined the beam of the flash all around. It had once been a small room with cement-block walls and floor, and metal ceiling, all overlaid with planking and attached wood shelving. There had been jars and tins and bottles and cans on the shelves, and those on the side walls were still there. The back wall, however, had been constructed as a false wall, a hidden door, and someone had broken through into darkness on the other side.
T. Laine said, “Ready.” She tossed the amulet into the dark, past the broken shelving and jars.
On the other side of the broken shelving was a cave, one I had missed in my read of the earth. The right wall was the ledge of stone I had read under the earth, but I hadn’t bothered to read around the ledge’s sides. It canted up at an angle on the other side of the root cellar, becoming the roof, making the cave a triangle, and the left wall was a different-color rock, gray with shiny stuff in it, like mica. The floor was smooth granite. In its center was a dried pool of blood.
“We’ll lose access to comms,” Rick said. “Stay in visual contact.”
A boy screamed in fear. Real fear. It shivered the air.
FireWind dove through the doors, breaking them with his massive body. Dashed in. Shoved me to the side.
I tilted. Falling.
Occam caught my arm. Righted me. Took my flashlight.
Rick grabbed the top framing of the door. Somersaulted down. Drew his weapon. Stepped inside to the left.
Rettell followed, stepping to the right. The two of them provided cover and cleared the first part of the cave space.
