The Blood Gospel (Page 23)

With a turn of his wrist, a blade appeared in his fingers as if out of thin air. He bared the edge: a sickle of silver, a hooked dagger, like some prehistoric claw.

With a sweep of his jacket, he dove across the threshold and vanished.

Immediately a savage wailing keened out of the darkness.

The sound sang to fears buried in her bones and bound her in place.

Even the hardened soldiers seemed to sense it. Jordan drew her farther from the entrance. McKay and Perlman flanked them, weapons pointed at the door. Retreating, regrouping, they took cover behind the sarcophagus.

A single piercing scream ripped from the tunnel.

Jordan lifted Erin as effortlessly as if her bones were hollow, her flesh immaterial. She felt that way already, as if she could float away.

He rolled her into the open sarcophagus. “Stay down, stay hidden.”

The steel in his voice and iron in his eyes grounded her back in her own skin—not that she wanted to be there. He pressed her lower. “Do you understand?”

“Yes.” She wanted to duck away, cover her head, shut out the horror, but when she did, sightlessness scared her more. Her fingers clung to the lip of the box. Like everyone else, she watched the pitch-dark mouth of the tunnel.

To the left, a sharp strike and flash drew her eye. McKay held a flaming flare.

“Toss it!” Jordan pointed to the dark exit.

McKay swung his arm and tossed the flare through the doorway. It tumbled end over end, leaving a trail of fire, and plunged into the well of darkness. Brightness forced back shadows, along with darker shapes. Erin lost count at four.

That left a lone figure in the center, standing in a shredded cassock, lit from the back. He held an arm over his eyes, blinded by the sudden flare. His other hand held up a curved dagger, blade dripping black blood, shimmering with reflected fire.

“Father!” Jordan yelled, raising his weapon. “Get down!”

The warning came too late.

Like rabid dogs, shadowed shapes leaped at the priest. They slammed him down. He landed hard atop the flare, quenching it with his body. Erin winced. Darkness again swallowed the scene—but not before a figure bounded over the priest and leaped headlong into the chamber.

It flew far, hit the stone floor, then shot straight at them, moving impossibly fast. A wolf? No. A man in wrinkled brown leather, arms wide, a butcher’s hook held aloft by one muscular arm.

Jordan dropped to one knee and fired up, striking the man square in the chest. The hail of rounds knocked him into the bricked roof. He dropped to the stone floor, hitting hard and going dead-still.

At the door, a mass of shadows rolled into the room. The priest wrestled with two black-suited figures. A third leaped past.

The attacker sped low and fast into Lieutenant Perlman. They hit the wall beside the crucified girl and dropped out of view. The Israeli’s rifle barked, blasting upward, rounds sparking off rock. Erin flattened herself in the stone box.

A shadow materialized above her. She caught a flash of teeth—too many teeth—and wished that she had a gun or a knife. She crossed both arms in front of her face and waited to feel the teeth in her skin.

Instead, bullets ripped through the torso above, and the bulk dropped atop her. She struggled out from under the body, her jeans wet with blood. Gritting her teeth, she searched the body for a weapon. No gun, but he carried an Egyptian khopesh with a long curved blade. She had seen similar swords in hieroglyphs and paintings, but such weapons hadn’t been used in battle for seven hundred years.

McKay peered over the edge of the sarcophagus. “You okay?”

Before she could answer, he vanished, hit broadside. She rose up on her knees, clutching the sword.

McKay sailed across the room and slammed into the wall, cracking his head. He fell to the floor, leaving a streak of blood on the wall behind him.

A dark figure leaped atop McKay and lunged at his throat.

5:08 P.M.

Jordan was pinned under an attacker who was stronger than anyone he had ever fought. He’d already lost his gun. The guy was also ridiculously fast.

Jordan twisted and grabbed for his ankle—and the KA-BAR dagger sheathed there. He freed it as bony hands lashed down. One clamped to his throat, the other held his arm pinned against the stone.

Nails dug deep, tearing flesh.

Wrenching his free arm around, he drove the KA-BAR blade deep into the assailant’s throat, to the hilt, until he hit bone, then ripped outward.

Blood washed down his arm.

The man went limp. Jordan threw off the deadweight and rolled to a crouch. His attention fixed on Erin, standing in the sarcophagus with a short, curved sword in one hand. She looked ready to climb out to help McKay, who lay on the other side of the room, but McKay was beyond anyone’s help now. Like Perlman, who was on the floor nearby, his throat had been torn away.

Jordan shot McKay’s attacker full in the chest, knocking him off his teammate’s body. Movement turned his head back to Erin.

A shadow loomed behind her.

He leaped toward her, but a hand shoved him aside. It felt like being clipped by a speeding truck. He lost his footing and crashed into the wall.

Dazed, he watched the priest barrel past him, knock Erin down, and tackle her attacker. He struck the bloody man with his shoulder and drove him backward, slamming him into the mummified girl on the wall. Dried bone exploded under their weight.

Korza rebounded back a step.

His opponent remained in place, hanging off the ground, impaled and writhing. The butt end of the crossbow bolts that penetrated his flesh held him aloft. One bolt poked out the man’s throat. Fingers scrabbled at it. Blood bubbled out of the wound, as if it were boiling.

Then Korza lashed out, severing the man’s throat with an explosive stroke.

Jordan regained his own shaky feet, crouched, searching all around. The priest stood before the wall, shoulders hunched under shredded garments. Dark blood dripped from his blade, from his fingertips. Jordan didn’t know how much of it came from the priest’s own wounds.

He kept his gun up as he stumbled to Erin. He saw no reason to check on his other teammates. He knew death when he faced it. As far as he could tell, the only ones still alive in this room were the priest, Erin, and him.

He kept a cautious eye on the priest, leery of his allegiances.

With a flare of his long jacket, Korza dropped to a knee, head bowed as if in prayer—but that was not his intent. He snatched something from the floor. It vanished into his black robes as he stood again.

The child’s small doll was gone.

Instead of checking on Erin, he’d gone to pick up a doll? Jordan gave up trying to figure the man out.