Darren Shan - City of the Snakes

There are several tunnels leading out of the cavern, but only one is large enough to accommodate the Coya ’s bed. There are no lights, but we take torches from the floor. The tunnel runs straight for three hundred feet, then divides in two, each passage the same height and width. We pause at the junction, searching for signs of our quarry, but they’ve left none.

“We will split into pairs,” Wami decides. “Ama and her beau can take—”

“No,” Raimi interrupts, stepping forward. His left leg drags, but he’s kept the pace so far, running on sheer determination and hatred. “They went left.”

“You are certain?” my father asks.

Raimi nods. “I’ve spent my time here chained to that foul bitch. I could sniff her out from the other side of the city. Left.”

Wami looks to me for confirmation and I shrug. “I’m happy to go with his call.”

“Very well.” The killer sets off down the tunnel. I hurry after him, Ama and Raimi not far behind.

We come to a number of subsequent junctions, and each time Raimi chooses the way. If he’s wrong about this we’ve lost them, probably forever.

We scramble over several small cave-ins as we progress, the first time we’ve encountered structural flaws. I mention them to my father and ask what he thinks. Raimi answers before he can. “The other tunnels and caves are kept up, but they haven’t bothered with these. They’ve grown arrogant and lazy. This path was laid many decades ago in case they needed to retreat, but they came to believe they were invulnerable, especially with Dorak and me affording them so much leeway.” He shakes his head, disgusted. “If I’d known they would be this easy to defeat, I’d have come after them years ago.”

“You wouldn’t have found them,” I tell him. “They’d have slipped away into the shadows and struck back at you when you weren’t expecting it. We’ve only rumbled them now because they were so close to victory that they couldn’t see the ruin on the flip side of the coin.”

Finally, as we turn into one of the narrower tunnels — there are marks on a wall where the edges of the bed scratched it, proof we’re on the right track — we hear the sound of voices and digging up ahead. “They must have hit a more serious cave-in,” my father grins, drawing a knife and testing its blade. “They are ours.”

“Wait,” Raimi says, tugging at the assassin’s robes. “I want to do this alone.”

“You are in no fit state to take them on,” Wami snorts.

“I wasn’t planning on a duel,” Raimi smiles, his face twisted with pain and exhaustion — but also triumph. “Lend me your vest.”

“Ah,” Wami purrs. “I see. But I would rather dispose of them the old-fashioned way if it’s all the same to you.”

“It isn’t,” Raimi growls. “I don’t care about the priests and priestesses — you can have them if any escape — but the queen is mine. Don’t push me on this.”

My father cocks an eyebrow. “Be careful whom you threaten, little man. You rule the roost up in Party Central, but down here you are nothing more than a mess of flesh and bones.”

“Can’t we do this together?” I ask. “We’ve come this far as a team. Why not—”

“You’ll all die if you challenge them,” Raimi says softly. “I sense death in the air. I’m as sure of this as I was of how to track the Coya. ”

“Nonsense,” Wami snorts. “Al is almost as good a fighter as his pappy. We will make short work of them, hmm, Al m’boy?”

I don’t reply. Raimi’s right. Death lies waiting for me— if I go to meet it.

“I’m not afraid of dying,” I mutter. “And I won’t regret it, not if I take that lot with me.”

“I believe you,” Raimi smiles. “But you don’t have to. I can do this alone. You can live, Mr. Jeery, or you can sacrifice yourself. Choose.”

“His choice is irrelevant,” Wami snarls. I will not step down under any—”

“Your doll,” Ama interrupts, and he glances at her sharply. “If you attack them, the Coya will destroy your doll.”

“Not if I cut her fucking head off first,” he barks.

“Do you want to run such a risk?” Ama asks. “This world’s full of people for you to kill. Are these few worth risking everything for?”

He stares at her, then chuckles grimly. “When you put it that way… Very well, Cardinal, the coup de grâce is yours. Enjoy.”

“I will,” Raimi beams, then turns to Ama. “See you in a few days?” The hope in his eye is pathetic.

“I guess,” she sniffs.

He looks at me and winks. “It’s been fun knowing you, blood brother .”

“Same here,” I grin.

“Visit me when I return. We have important issues to settle.”

“I’ll come,” I promise. I start to undo the straps of my vest, remember the dolls stashed there, and fake a groan. “Give him yours,” I tell my father. “I pulled a muscle earlier. My shoulder’s killing me.”

Wami wriggles out of his vest, straps it over Raimi’s robes and shows him how to detonate the charges. The Cardinal waves to us, then hobbles down the tunnel after the Coya, leaving the rest of us to withdraw and strike for the lights of the world above.

I’m in agony that no ordinary man could endure, but that’s nothing new. I’ve spent the last few months exploring all the stars, planets and moons in a universe of pain. The villacs put me through every kind of torture imaginable, while that she bitch looked on and laughed. And then they put me through it again. And again. What’s different now is that I’m a free agent. I could stop, sit, rest. Any small measure of relief would be a blessing. But if I pause, I won’t be able to rise. I’ll just lie there until I die.

Dragging my left leg behind me, gritting the few teeth I have left, I march onward, enduring the pain, welcoming it — the worse I feel, the sweeter it’ll be when I send those bastards to hell. I gave my flashlight to Jeery, so I’m operating in darkness. That doesn’t worry me. I don’t need to be able to see to find that cow. I could zero in on her if I were deaf, dumb and blind.

I’m not sure what will happen to me when I kill the Coya . I was created to last through eternity, immune to death, but that power came from the queen and her priests. Perhaps, when they are no more, I’ll cease to exist as well. If so, so be it. I’ve spent ten years training myself to accept a life without end, but immortality hasn’t been easy to adapt to. Genuine death isn’t an altogether unwelcome prospect.

I’d miss Ama though. Seeing her again almost made all the pain and humiliation worthwhile. I thought the woman the priests sent to lure me underground was an illusion. I’d dismissed her from my thoughts during my long days and nights of suffering. I hadn’t dared believe she could be real.

Now that I know she is, I long to spend time with her, tell her what she meant to me, how much it pained me to sacrifice her. I want to explain that I had no choice, I was a puppet incapable of severing its strings. I want to touch her, even if it’s just one last time, hold her, kiss her, whisper words in her ear that I can whisper to no other because I can love none but her.

But I’m afraid. What if she rejects me? What if she hates me for what I did to her? I’d rather die the one true death than have her spurn me. She fussed over me in the cavern of the Coya , but that might have been a sympathetic reaction. Perhaps it will be for the best if my spirit’s set free by the destruction of the Incas.

I’m close now, a turn or two away. Their voices are loud and clear, as are the sounds of their fingers and knives on the rubble they’re frantically trying to burrow through. The flickering lights of torches make the tunnel seem warm and homey. The priestesses can’t navigate as capably in the dark as the villacs , even though they’ve spent their lives out of sight of the moon they worship.