She tossed her braid back over her shoulder again, the corners of her mouth slanting down. “I did not think—as you said, the story is impossible to believe for anyone who has not lived it. One cannot go about prattling on about Shadows and immortality and such and be hired for delicate jobs, you see.”
“I do see,” Nicholas said, understanding better now why she worked as a mercenary, rather than inside the fold of the Thorns and Ironwoods. A secret was easiest kept by one, or none.
“It’s all true,” Li Min said. “And if we cannot escape, then we will never leave this place.”
The tortured cries died to whimpers. Li Min placed a finger to her lips. Nicholas held his breath, reaching for a weapon on his tunic’s belt that was no longer there. He looked to Li Min, who blatantly ignored him, keeping both weapons in her hands and lowering into a defensive stance. But then his attention was drawn upward again, toward the entrance to the tomb.
They sounded as any man’s footsteps would in a careful approach. It was only when that same scratching began, that long, continuous drag of sound, that Nicholas realized they weren’t hearing anything at all—not through so many layers of old stone. They were feeling the vibrations of the movements. Plaster shook loose from the ceiling, and he wondered, with a sickening twist of his stomach, what could be so heavy as to have caused that.
“Li Min,” he whispered. “Do they use a peculiar kind of weapon—a long, thin blade like a claw?”
“Yes,” she breathed out. “They receive it upon their initiation. So you have seen them for yourselves.”
They had. They’d struggled blow for blow against them in Carthage, without ever realizing it. His hand reached up and closed around the small amulet and Etta’s earring. The shaking worsened, thunder crackling through the walls, making it sound as though whoever these travelers—these Shadows—were, they were in the tomb beside them.
This is hell, he thought, or all the devils have escaped.
The light around him dampened as Sophia reached over and dimmed the lantern.
If they died down here, who would be the last of them to bear witness to the others’ screams?
Cease this at once! he barked at himself. My God, he was becoming prone to theatrics in a way that would have made Chase weep with pride. A heap of good that would do him. He’d fight, as he always had. He’d give Sophia and Li Min the opportunity to escape, and then he would follow. He would not die down here in the dark when there was a future to claim.
Nicholas could not say how much time passed before muffled voices began to bleed through the walls. He spoke French and Spanish, as well as passable Italian, owing to his time mixing with other sailors in ports. He could speak and read Latin and a touch of Greek, thanks to the patience of Mrs. Hall, but this was simply too low to make out.
Li Min cocked her head toward the door, her face twisting in concentration. For the first time in their short acquaintance, he saw a tremor of helplessness run through her expression, and a lingering flare of hope he didn’t know had died out.
There was a moment of silence before another sound began to drift through the air, curling against his skin, making his every hair stand at attention. It seemed so out of place that his mind had trouble placing it:
Laughter.
Sophia pressed a hand against her mouth. Nicholas’s skin felt as though it might actually retreat from his bones.
The steps grew softer. The vibrations settled from quakes to shivers to nothing at all. He and Li Min exchanged one last look before he released the tension that had wound up his system. He took a deep breath, expanding his lungs and chest until both ached.
“Change,” Li Min told him. “Quickly. We will need to leave before they think to return.”
Nicholas nodded, moving back to the pile of clothes. “Do you require assistance with your boots?” he asked Sophia. Her arms and hands were moving again, but he had yet to see the same of her legs and feet.
She drew in a sharp breath and, with great effort and an enormous swallowing of pride, nodded.
“I will do it,” Li Min said, brushing his hands away. He glanced at Sophia, ensuring she was comfortable with this, before picking up the breeches and sliding them on. They were undersized, which might have been a comment on how Li Min viewed him, but was more likely a matter of what was available—what she could steal or purchase without incurring any notice.
She herself wore a heavy cloak that served to blot her out of sight. He hadn’t considered before how strange it was to have a slight advantage over someone else, in spite of the disadvantages the world had foisted upon him. A dark-skinned man in the Papal City, especially one in simple clothing, would not be nearly as remarkable as a young Chinese woman.
The boots were also small, but tolerable. He turned his back to the others for a moment, changed out of the soiled tunic, and slipped the soft linen shirt on, tucking it into the breeches. He left his own doublet unlaced, ignoring how short it was on his frame. No one would be allowed to see him long enough to question it; and, well, the world had a way of ignoring its poor and simple.
He ran a hand over his face, the rasp of whiskers growing in. “If we should need to fight…”
“Aim for their skulls, throats, or along their sides just below the rib cage where the seams of their chest plates can be cut,” Li Min said. “We are safer disappearing.”
“Is there a passage nearby?”
“Two upstairs,” Sophia said. “I can guide us. Help me up, will you?” She reached an arm out. Nicholas and Li Min both moved to her side, but he arrived first, gripping her by the wrist and pulling her upright—and, as it turned out, forward. Her legs gave out and she gasped in alarm.