James Rollins - Map of Bones

She glanced over to Vigor. He wore a large grin.

“What?”

“I walked right past it,” Vigor said, joining her. “I should have considered that another stone would point the way. First hematite, then magnetite, now bauxite.”

Kat stood, confused.

“Bauxite is mined right here in this area. In fact, it’s named after the Lords of Baux, whose castle lies only ten miles from here. It sits atop a hill of bauxite. This stone points a finger back at them.”

“So?”

“The Lords of Baux had an uneasy relationship with the French popes, their new neighbors. But they were best known for an odd claim they asserted most vehemently. They claimed to be descended from a famous biblical figure.”

“Who?” Kat asked.

“Balthazar. One of the Magi.”

Kat’s eyes widened. She turned back to the hearth. “They sealed the opening with stones from the Magi’s descendants.”

“Do you still doubt we’ve found the right spot?” Vigor asked.

Kat shook her head. “But how do we open it? I don’t see any keyhole.”

“You already told us. Electricity.”

As if emphasizing the point, thunder boomed through the thick walls.

Kat shed out of her pack. It was worth a try. “We don’t have any of those ancient batteries.” She pulled out a larger flashlight. “But I have some modern Duracell Coppertops.”

She cracked open her flashlight and used the tip of a knife to tease loose the positive and negative wires. With the power switch off, she twisted them together, then lifted her handiwork.

“You’d better stand back,” Kat warned.

Reaching out, she brought the flashlight’s wires into contact with the bauxite stone, a weakly conductive ore. She flicked the flashlight’s switch.

An arc of electricity stabbed to the stone. A deep bass tone responded as if a large drum had been struck.

Kat darted back as the tone faded. She joined Vigor by the wall.

Along the edges of the stone hearth, a fiery glow spread, scribing the entire firepit.

“I think they’ve cemented the blocks with molten m-state glass,” Kat mumbled.

“Like the ancient Egyptian builders used molten lead to cement the Pharos Lighthouse.”

“And now the electricity is releasing the stored power in the glass.”

Other traceries of fire jittered across the face of the hearth, outlining each and every stone. It flared brighter, searing a crisscrossed pattern onto her retina. Heat washed out toward them.

Kat shielded her eyes. But the effect didn’t last long. As the glow faded, the stone blocks of bauxite began to fall away, no longer cemented, tumbling down into a pit hidden below the hearth.

Kat heard the crash of stone on stone. A rattling continued as the blocks tumbled deeper. No longer able to restrain her curiosity, she stepped forward and shone her penlight. The edges of the hearth now outlined a dark staircase leading down.

She turned to Vigor. “We’ve done it.”

“Heaven help us,” he said.

AQUARTER mile from his castle, Raoul lowered his cell phone and stalked away from his truck. Fury narrowed his vision to pinpoints. Blood dripped from a scalp wound. That Asian bitch had betrayed him. But he would get his satisfaction. His dogs would make short work of all of them.

And if not…

He crossed to the second truck. He pointed to two men. “You and you. Return to the chateau. On foot. Stand guard at the portcullis. Shoot anyone you see move. No one leaves that courtyard alive.”

The pair piled out of the truck and set a fast pace back to the castle.

Raoul returned to the lead vehicle.

Alberto waited for him. “What did the Imperator say?” he asked as Raoul climbed into the front passenger seat.

Raoul pocketed his cell phone. The Guild betrayal had surprised their leader as much as it did Raoul. But Raoul had left out his own treachery back in Alexandria, leaving the bitch to die and lying about it. He should’ve expected something. He pounded a fist on his knee. When she handed the American to him, he had let his guard down.

Stupid.

But matters would be rectified.

In Avignon.

Raoul answered Alberto, “The Imperator will be joining us in France, along with more forces. We push ahead as planned.”

“And the others?” Alberto glanced back toward the chateau.

“They no longer matter. There’s nothing they can do to stop us.”

Raoul waved the driver forward. The truck headed for the Yverdon airfield. He shook his head at his losses here. Not the men. The bitch. Rachel Verona. He had such bloody plans for her….

But at least he had left her a little parting gift.

RACHEL GATHERED with Gray and Seichan on the steps to the main castle, their backs to the metal shutters over the doors. Moving stealthily, they had retreated from the pack of dogs to this relative shelter.

They still only had the one gun. Six bullets.

Gray had attempted to scrounge another weapon amidst the fiery carnage in the courtyard, but all he found were two damaged rifles. Gray carried Seichan’s weapon. She was busy with a GPS unit, concentrating fully, trusting Gray to watch her back.

What was she doing?

Rachel kept a step away from the woman, closer to Gray. One hand clutched his shirttail. She didn’t know when she had grabbed it, but she didn’t let go. It was all that was keeping her on her feet.

One of the pit-dogs padded silently past the bottom of the stairs. It dragged a limb of one of the dead soldiers. Twenty of the monsters roamed the yard, tearing at bodies, snarling and spitting at one another. A few fights broke out, savage, lightning-fast tussles.

It wouldn’t be long before their pig-eyed attention turned to them.

Any noise drew the beasts. The moaning injured died first. They all knew that once the first shot was fired, the entire pack would be upon them.

Six bullets. Twenty dogs.

Off to the side, movement…

Through the oily smoke, a thin figure rose among the debris, wobbly, unsteady. A breeze blew the haze away, and Rachel recognized the shape, teetering on thin legs.

“ Nonna …” she whispered.

Blood caked the old woman’s hair on the left side.

Rachel had thought her grandmother had escaped with Raoul.

Had the explosion knocked her down?

But Rachel supposed otherwise. Raoul must have pistol-whipped her out of the way, leaving her behind, useless baggage.

A moan rose from the old woman. She lifted a hand to the side of her head. “Papa!” she called feebly in a strained voice.

The blow, the confusion, the looming castle must have dislocated her grandmother, drawing her into the past.

“Papa…” Pain beyond her head injury keened in her voice.

But Rachel wasn’t the only one to hear the pain.

A few meters away, a dark shape rose from behind a flaming tire, stalking out of the smoke, drawn by the frail cry.

Rachel let go of Gray’s belt and stumbled a step down.

“I see it,” Gray said, stopping her with a hand.

He raised his gun, aimed, and squeezed the gun. The pop was explosive in the silent yard, but the yelp of the target was louder as the dog pitched over and rolled. Howls rose from it. It gnashed at its wounded back leg, attacking the pain. Other dogs swooped down upon it. Drawn by the blood. Lions on a wounded gazelle.

Rachel’s grandmother, startled by the beast, had fallen on her backside, mouth frozen in an O of surprise.

“I have to get to her,” Rachel whispered. It was an instinctive reaction. Despite the treachery, her nonna still had a place in her heart. She didn’t deserve to die like this.