FORTY-FOUR

Billy was lost, of course, as he pushed Jordan in a wheelchair through the tunnel, thinking about the shots they’d heard just before going into the mountain. Occasionally, Jordan directed him to turn down another tunnel at an intersection. Then another. Billy had no sense of direction in the maze of tunnels that had once formed a coal mine.

Pierce walked silently with them but didn’t seem to mind that they were lost. Jordan was taking them to safety.

Trouble was, Billy knew he wasn’t lost enough.

Jordan had made Billy promise that he wouldn’t remember which path they had used to reach a hidden entrance into the mountain. Jordan had promised that Billy wouldn’t even remember that a wheelchair had been waiting.

So it bothered Billy that he could still vaguely remember those promises. Wasn’t he supposed to forget them too? Or was he so big that they hadn’t given him enough dosage, like with the communion wafers?

His memories were like shifting sheets of fog. Occasionally, they would lift, and he’d see it clearly. The path that took them away from where the choppers had dropped soldiers. One of the Clan waiting inside the tunnel with a wheelchair for Jordan, because Jordan was having too much difficulty walking.

And he’d remember, too, that Caitlyn had left the cabin, and that there had been an undercurrent of tension, like she was going into some kind of danger that no one discussed, no matter how many times he asked. He would remember, certainly, that he missed her.

Then the fog would return, and Billy would be happy. He only remembered that he and Pierce and Theo and Gloria were going to be sent Outside. He didn’t know how or where. That was the entire reason that all three had agreed to drink the water with a drug to erase their short-term memories.

But he wasn’t even supposed to remember that!

Maybe he should have had more of the water to drink. After all, if his body was so big that a regular dose of communion wafers didn’t do to him what it did to others, maybe that was the same for the drugged water.

He felt guilty over this.

He leaned forward to tell Jordan that maybe he shouldn’t be allowed to escape because he knew too much, but the fog descended, and Billy found himself opening his mouth but forgetting what he was going to say.

He kept pushing the wheelchair. When Jordan gave him directions again at another intersection of tunnels, Billy remembered Caitlyn again.

He began to worry once more. Until, mercifully, another patch of fog shifted his thoughts away.

A hundred yards into the tunnel beyond the headquarters, Mason reached the end, where the tunnel formed a T.

Left or right?

His ultraviolet light picked up the small giveaway circle of the tip of Caitlyn’s cane going down the left tunnel. The circle was fading; he needed to catch her soon.

He stepped left.

A split second later, the tunnel lights went black. A brief orange flare threw illumination ripples down the dirt walls, and then the sound of the explosion thundered behind him. Delayed by a heartbeat, the whoosh of air blew past Mason, taking with it a cloud of dust that continued down the tunnel.

It dropped him to his knees. He choked on the dust.

When he stood, he searched with his ultraviolet light for the glowing white circles of the girl’s cane tracks.

Nothing.

He switched on his flashlight and cursed.

The tunnel behind him was blocked. The soldiers of Bar Elohim couldn’t chase him and take away his trophy, leaving him as the sole hunter. But the fine dust was settling on the floor of the tunnel, wiping out the ultraviolet tracks.

If she reached another turn, how would he track her? And now there was more at stake than just catching her. She wouldn’t have fled if she didn’t know a way out of the mountain.

Mason needed to follow her just to save his own life.

At that thought, the tunnel walls seemed to squeeze the life from him. He couldn’t endure the thought of being lost in the depths of the mountain, wandering around until first his batteries ran out, then his own energy, then his life, until time dried him out like a mummy.

The image made him lick his lips. All he tasted was dust.

He cursed again, looking down. The floor of the tunnel had a uniform layer of dust. Each step he took left a smudged print.

So would she.

All he had to do was continue until he found her tracks. At maximum, she had only a five-minute head start.

And she was walking with an injured foot. At this thought, he shed his claustrophobia and fear of darkness. He was a hunter. Doing what he did best.