“Yeah?” I stepped away from the bed, not knowing how I felt about this announcement. “Well, don’t let me stop you,” I said, walking across the rug, back toward the bedroom door. “If you want to hide in the back and take potshots, that’s your—”
I stopped. Part of the floor beneath my boots had shifted slightly, a faint creak rising from beneath the rug. I stomped down, and heard a hollow, rattling thump, like the boards underneath weren’t entirely solid.
We pulled back the rug. Beneath it lay a square section of floor that had obviously been cut out and replaced. Grabbing the rope handle, I yanked it back, revealing a trapdoor with a steel ladder going down into the dark.
“Bingo,” Tristan breathed.
A minute later, the whole squad was assembled at the bottom of the ladder, our tactical lights scanning what looked to be a cave tunnel, natural stone walls and rocky floors snaking away into the black.
“All right,” Talbot murmured, his voice echoing down the corridor. “Everyone, stay alert. We have them on the run, and the most dangerous lizard is a trapped, cornered lizard. We don’t want to be ambushed down here.”
He took point, and we followed the escape tunnel, the only sounds the scuffle of our boots on the rock and the drip of water somewhere overhead. Except for our lights, it was pitch-black, and at times the passageway narrowed to spots where we had to proceed single file, our helmets brushing the ceiling as we passed.
“Shit,” Talbot breathed from up front. I peered over Tristan’s shoulder and saw the tunnel had split, veering off in two different directions.
“Dammit.” Talbot shone his light down one passage, then the other. “All right, looks like we have no choice. Sebastian, St. Anthony, take the left tunnel. Clement, you’re with me. We can’t let the targets escape. Just...be careful, you two,” he added as Tristan and I headed toward the leftmost tunnel. “Radio us if you find the target, but do what you have to do. Good hunting, and take care of the greenie, St. Anthony.”
“Roger that,” Tristan muttered as we passed. “See you on the other side.”
We followed the tunnel for several silent minutes, our flashlight beams sliding over rocks and limestone and the occasional puddle. Sometimes we had to duck to avoid the low ceiling, and at one point, the roof dropped so low, we had to proceed in a crouch. I tried not to imagine what would happen if a dragon ambushed us here, in a cramped stone hallway, with nowhere to turn or hide if it was suddenly filled with dragonfire.
I was relieved when the tunnel opened up into a large cavern, stalagmites and rocky outcroppings jutting from the floor. Stalactites hung from the ceiling like stony fangs, dripping icy water into the puddles at our feet. At the far end of the room, a thread of sunlight slanted across the floor from between a large pile of rocks. Tristan nodded, and we approached cautiously, guns at the ready, until we came to the base of the pile. Looking up, I could see the glimmer of light between the stones, flickers of open air and the outside world.
“Huh,” my partner murmured, sweeping his light over the rocks. “Looks like there was an opening here at one point, probably the cave entrance. Most likely, the targets were hoping to escape this way, but weren’t expecting the cave-in.” He shone his light on a pile of rocks that looked like it had been recently disturbed, perhaps frantically cast aside. His voice turned hard. “But, if that’s the case...”
He spun, just as a dark shape popped from behind a shadowy crag and fired on us, gunshots flaring white in the near blackness. I felt something slam into my combat armor, rocking me back a step. In the two seconds it took for me to regroup, Tristan had raised his weapon and opened fire. The roar of his assault rifle filled the chamber, a deafening cacophony of light, sparks and chaos, before everything faded into silence once more.
Tristan waited a moment, keeping his gun trained on the shadows, before nodding to me. Carefully, I approached the spot the shots had come from, finger curled around the trigger, ready to fire again if needed. I saw a shape on the ground between two boulders and shone my light between them, revealing a middle-aged human male in civilian clothes, blood streaming from his chest and forehead, his eyes staring out at nothing. A heavy pistol was clutched in one limp hand.
“Dead?” Tristan called from where he stood behind me.
I lowered my gun. “Yeah,” I muttered, turning away so that I wouldn’t have to see those blank, accusing eyes. Not out of sorrow or guilt; he was a dragon servant and would have killed us if he could. But I hadn’t been ready, and that made me furious with myself. I’d been taken off guard, surprised in this dark hole, and that could not ever happen again.