I could smell it—the cold, the damp, the promise of escape. Will had already started down, the Baroness in his arms, vanishing into the darkness below.
Bisch handed Otto to me. The old man weighed almost nothing, his body broken and bleeding against my chest.
“Go,” Bisch said. “I will hold them.”
“You’ll die.”
“Perhaps.” He checked his weapon. Three rounds left, maybe four. “But not today. Now go.”
Behind me, I heard Bisch’s pistol bark one final time.
Then I was in the channel, crawling through the darkness, Otto’s blood warm as it leaked across my skin. The only sounds were my own ragged breathing and the distant echo of men who wanted us dead.
17
Will
Iwent first, the Baroness clutched against my chest, her head tucked beneath my chin. She was conscious now—barely. Her breath came in shallow gasps against my neck. Her ruined hands pressed between us, and I felt the wet heat of fresh blood soaking through my shirt.
“Stay with me,” I told her. “We’re almost out.”
A lie. We were nowhere close to out.
Behind me, I heard Thomas grunting with effort, dragging Otto’s broken body through the narrow passage. Behind him, somewhere in the darkness above, gunfire. Bisch was buying us time with bullets he couldn’t spare.
The channel pressed in on all sides.
Stone scraped my shoulders, my back, tore at my clothes.
The Baroness moaned softly each time I jostled her, and each whimper cut through me like a blade.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry—”
“William.” Her voice was barely a breath. “Stop apologizing. Keep moving.”
I kept moving.
The passage twisted left, then right, then dropped sharply. I half slid, half fell down the incline, clutching the Baroness tight, my free hand scraping uselessly against wet stone. We landed hard at the bottom, and she cried out.
“Will!” Thomas’s voice, somewhere above. “You okay?”
“Fine. Keep coming.”
I wasn’t fine. My shoulder screamed where I’d landed on it, but the Baroness was still breathing and conscious, and that was all that mattered.
The smell grew worse as we descended. Sewage and rot and the cold mineral tang of ancient stone overwhelmed my senses. Water seeped around us, soaking through my pants. I tried not to think about what I was crawling through, tried not to think about the Baroness’s wounds exposed to this contamination.
We’d worry about infection if we survived.
A sound behind me.
It was Thomas sliding down the same incline, cursing as he landed.
Otto made no sound at all.
“He’s still breathing,” Thomas gasped, “but barely.”
“Keep going.”
