"I really hate the ocean," Pavel said after removing his rebreather. "I hate everything about it."
"Where is Drova?" Anandur asked.
"Right behind me. She got annoyed when I stayed too close to her."
"Ouch." Anandur chuckled. "Do you have that effect on all females?"
Pavel grimaced. "Not at all. Just the one that counts."
"Oy." Anandur put a hand over his chest. "Do I smell love in the air?"
"You smell mold."
When Drova surfaced a few minutes later, she pulled off her mask and looked around the cove with a flat expression that gave nothing away. If she'd been scared down there, and Anandur would have bet that she had been, she wouldn't let anyone know.
Pavel was smart enough not to offer Drova a hand up, and she climbed onto the shelf effortlessly.
Julian was next, surfacing with his sealed medical pack strapped across his back.
"How was it?" Anandur asked.
Julian shrugged. "I wouldn't do it for fun, but it was okay. I just hope that after this mission I won't have to dive for a very long time."
While the Odus organized the gear, Brody drifted over to the submarine and ran a hand along the hull. "Shame we can't take her home. I bet Julian wouldn't mind diving in this beauty."
The physician cast a glance at the luxury vehicle. "That's right." He turned to Anandur. "Is there anything stopping us from taking it?"
"It has a biometric lock keyed to Navuh," Yamanu said. "We could have taken his fingerprints and retina scan and used them to open it, but it also requires a code that only he knows. Regrettably, he is immune to compulsion, so getting it out of him wasn't an option." He looked at the sub bobbing gently on the water. "As nice as it is, it's not worth the effort. It's just a fancy toy."
"I could have gotten the code out of him the old-fashioned way." Anandur punched his fist into his palm. "And enjoyed every moment of it."
Brody chuckled. "I would have helped, but that old bastard is tough. I doubt he would have cracked."
Anandur smiled. "Does it matter? It would have been tremendously satisfying to beat the crap out of him."
The problem was Areana, and Annani's promise to her sister to show Navuh mercy he didn't deserve. What he deserved was an eternity in hell for all the suffering he'd caused over the last five thousand years.
"We should move out," Yamanu said after reporting to the war room that everyone had made it safely to the cove. "The tech crew is probably halfway down the tunnel by now."
The entrance to the side tunnel that led down to the cove was narrow, but the incline wasn't too bad, and the march to the mansion got underway.
Lights came up automatically as they passed them, but given that the tech crew had already taken care of this section, the motion detection activated nothing other than the bulbs.
The tunnel smelled just as Anandur had expected, of salt and mold, the way places that never saw the sun did. When the incline ended, the narrow tunnel coming up from the cove met the main one, which was wide enough for a vehicle to drive through, and it was paved, which made their march easier.
Anandur and Yamanu led the procession, with the Guardians and Kra-ell sandwiched between them and the Odus, who brought up the rear, carrying the heavy digging gear. There was probably enough of it on site, but just in case the digging crews stored their equipment for the night, the team brought everything they needed with them.
After about an hour, they caught up to the tech crew, and after another hour and a half, they reached the end of the tunnel, where the jeep was parked.
"We have arrived at the mansion side," Yamanu reported to the war room. "Going in."
A door led to the basement, or so Anandur hoped. Eluheed and Tony had never gone to the other side of the tunnel, so they didn't know what was on the mansion side of it, and Kian didn't want to ask Losham or Number One because neither of them was supposed to know about the clan coming to retrieve the chests. They were both under the impression that the clan wanted them to deliver the chests to one of the ships in the harbor.
Once there, Yamanu held up a fist to signal for everyone to be quiet, put his ear to the rock, and listened.
"Seems clear," he said after a moment, and looking at Anandur, he received a confirming nod. He too did not sense anyone on the other side of the access door.
There was no handle, and Yamanu felt along the panel until he found the catch, and the panel swung outward on silent hinges. Beyond it was not the basement but a cramped square of a space with a tight spiral staircase climbing up into the dark on one side. Those must be Navuh's private stairs, leading straight up to his quarters or his office. After all, he'd made the journey from the harem to the mansion and back on a daily basis, and he'd somehow kept it a secret.
