BLOOD GURKHA: Prophesy (James Pace novels Book 5) (24 page)

'What is it?' called Pace. 'What can you see?'

'Another trap door,' she explained. 'A couple of feet above my head. No ladder or rope,' she added, 'but if you give me a lift, I can reach it easily.'

'Must be another building,' Pace reasoned. 'One of the smaller houses.'

'More houses?' Shilan had only seen the hall when she'd entered the clearing. The exposed patches of sunken rooftops had not registered with her at the time.

Not wanting to explain himself at that moment, Pace pushed his way as far out into the shaft as he could, on all fours, allowing Shilan to manoeuvre her feet up onto his back. With a bit of huffing and puffing, Pace made it completely out of the side tunnel. Reaching up, Shilan's fingertips brushed the underside of the trap door but she needed more height to push it open.

Moving from all fours, to kneeling up, they worked as a fluid team; no words needed. As soon as Pace's shoulders lifted, Shilan moved her feet from his back on to them, bracing herself by pressing her hands against the dirt walls of the shaft as he rose up onto his feet in a single, powerful motion.

He was six feet tall, so Pace had to pause in a half stoop to stop Shilan's head smashing into the underside of the door. She felt surprisingly heavy but Pace did not have to remain in this uncomfortable position for too long, luckily. 

Wasting no time, Shilan transferred her hands from the wall to the wood and heaved with all of her might. The trap door sprang open, crashing down into the unseen world above and she stood up on his shoulders, neatly stepping up onto the floor level above.

Standing up, Pace judged the distance to the lip of the trap door, bent down and tossed up first the backpack and then, more carefully, handed up the Mauser to Shilan, who knelt beside the opening and reached down for it.

Eager to get out of the shaft and its uncanny sense of being inside a freshly dug grave, Pace flexed his knees a little and then sprang upwards, clamping his hands firmly over the edge. A swift pull up movement of his arms and he was able to haul himself out to find Shilan seated nearby, studying their destination. She did not need to move her head to light up the entire space, even with the weaker head torch beam.

They were in a square room; as dank and musty as the inside of the hall, no larger than three metres across. The underside of its rusting corrugated iron roof, single shuttered window and battered looking wooden door, made up from slatted planks, was all that broke the monotony. The floor of this tiny house had a wooden floor exactly like the larger hall but it appeared more rotten, with patches of green moss and yellowish lichen eating away at it in places where the roof clearly leaked during the warmer months of the year.

'I did not notice any other buildings,' Shilan stood up and dusted her self down. 'They're all buried under the snow, am I correct in thinking?' Pace eyed her for a moment before nodding. She had performed amazingly well during the attack; too well for a run-of-the-mill hospital surgeon.

'There are a dozen or so dotted around this flat area,' he explained, standing up to join her. 'I came here with an archaeologist named Hill. He had a map in his pack showing where they all should be.'

'He's dead?' Again Pace nodded, sombrely this time. 'How? Was it the same bears that just tried to kill us, or were they tigers?'

Pace regarded her thoughtfully. There was no rush to leave the tiny house. Buried to its roof, undisturbed for a century, the Yeti would have no reason to start digging around to try and find them and their scent would be well masked. The tunnels had clearly been cut as a way to travel for one person only, perhaps for when the snow became too heavy to move on the surface? It was just a guess but it made sense.

'Not bears and not tigers,' he said. 'Believe it or not, they were Yeti. Hungry, ferocious, mythical, shouldn't-exist-but-they-do, Abominable Snowmen.'

Shilan's eyes widened with incredulity but she did not immediately respond. Pace had no reason to lie to her about anything, that she could think of. He clearly knew about her part in robbing Deborah of her womb and ovaries, for implantation into Josephine Roche, but why would making such an absurd statement help him?

Pace moved away from her and started unpacking the backpack. The first job as to find the stripper clips, which he located swiftly. Once the Mauser had been reloaded, he propped it up against the closed door and turned his attention to checking the state of their provisions. Equally distributed between his back and Hill's, he ended up with a fairly poor tally. Two days of fresh water and the same in vacuum-sealed survival meals, supplemented by a few packets of biscuits and a couple of Mars bars. Water was not a problem; they were surrounded by snow, but their food was.

Shilan realised it as soon as she saw it. The food was easily recognisable as Wayfayrer from the packaging; one of the world's most popular producers of pre-cooked meals for adventurers and explorers. She had eaten her fair share of this type of food in her time, as had Pace. Safe to eat hot, or cold, you normally threw the whole pouch into a pot of boiling water and heated it for about ten minutes. Packed with calories and surprisingly tasty, she would normally have been delighted to see them. Especially given how ravenously hungry she suddenly felt.

'We won't be able to heat them up,' she commented. 'We can eat this stuff cold but…'

'But,' Pace interrupted her, 'this kind of food will give off a strong smell, even cold. It would bring every predator within half a mile sniffing around until they dug us out.'

'I know,' she agreed sadly. 'Before we can eat a hot meal, we will need to get far away from this place.'

'That isn't going to be easy. Those creatures back there are clearly apex predators in this forest. Why they're here, and hungry for human prey, I have no idea but we have to assume they know we're still around somewhere. They're not going to give up and just wander away, not for a while at least.'

'So you're saying we're stuck here?'

'For now, yes. Hopefully they will keep looking for us until daylight and then head off to sleep, assuming they're nocturnal, of course. They still have Hill's body which they haven't had time to eat yet.'

'Let's say, for a moment, that I believe your story about gigantic, killer apes. What makes you think they want to eat a human corpse? Maybe your friend was killed because he encroached upon their territory. Very few primates eat flesh,' she punctuated the idea with this powerful fact.

'Does it matter?' Pace threw back at her. 'They've killed before, according to history and they've killed today.' He drew in a deep breath of the stale, musty air. 'There is an old adage in law which states that previous behaviour is an accepted indicator of future behaviour. If they decide to chew on our bones, or not, they're still going to kill us.'

Shilan found no fault with his logic. 'If you can put aside your anger with me about Deborah,' she began, seeing his face hardened at the mention of the journalist's name, 'I would really like to hear the details of what happened to you and Hill. As you say, it doesn't look like we'll be going anywhere for at least a few hours.'

Pace did not want to be near her, or even speak to her because of what she'd done, but they were together, like it or not, and a bit of human conversation would at least help to pass the time. With his disinterest in speaking to Rachel Crown the day before, he was not doing too well forging new friendships with women, he mused. His main reason for deciding to talk to her came down to the fact that she had been close to Josephine Roche and might well know where she was hiding.

That information was priceless to him so they spent the next hour sitting on the floor, sipping at a bottle of water each, while he regaled her with the gory details.

At the end, Shilan had no doubt that Pace had just told her the awful, sickening truth.

Yeti did exist and they hunted people.

26

They passed the remainder of the night, and the morning of the next day, inside the buried house before judging it worth the risk to try and leave. With no hope of exiting through the door or window, Pace was able to reach up and comfortably push at the corner of the corrugated roof, which immediately separated from its rotting wooden peg fasteners. This building was one of those completely buried in snow so it took some effort to put enough strength into his labours without making any noise at the same time.

It took a few minutes but, eventually, he worked enough of the roof free from its snow cover and peered out. The daylight hurt his eyeballs; searing from a brilliant yellow orb sitting within a vividly azure sky. Not a single cloud interrupted a gorgeous view of the snow-capped peaks. The surrounding forest lay peaceful and would not have been out of place on the front cover of a sky holiday brochure; appearing idyllic.

Nothing was moving out across the snowy ground and he could just make out the hall, if he twisted slightly. Pace could clearly see some remnants of the shutters littering the snow outside, lying amidst churned up snow, but most of the debris would be inside the building, on the floor where the creatures had smashed their way inwards.

'What does it look like?' whispered Shilan impatiently. She despised inactivity and was ready to run a gauntlet of teeth if necessary. 'Any chance we can make it to your helicopter and get the hell off this mountain?'

Pace knew it looked peaceful but his sixth sense still clamoured a warning, though not as determinedly as before. It was almost warning him to a background danger.

'It looks clear.' He was also minded to make a break for it. They had already decided that when they went, if they went, that speed would need to be as fast as possible. It would create more noise but safety for them lay down the trail, back at the Lynx.

'Are we going?'

Just for a second, Pace's eyes caught a movement in the trees, just behind the hall. A huge pile of snow fell from a disturbed bough of a large pine tree. Scanning the area intently, pulse immediately racing, he could not see what had caused it to fall but it jangled his nerves and made him acutely aware that their chances of getting out of the village alive were not guaranteed, despite the beautiful sunshine.

'I think they're still out there, just beyond the trees. Something just moved. They could be watching, just waiting for us to break cover.'

'Where?'

'Over by the main hall. I just saw something move.'

'Could be a rabbit, or a deer?' Shilan suggested. 'I still think it's worth the risk.'

'Maybe,' Pace agreed, focusing as intently as he could at the spot where the snow had fallen. 'The only way to know for sure is to make a run for the downhill trail but,' he reasoned, 'to do that, we'll have to give up our hiding spot.' Shilan made no reply from behind him so he rephrased it. 'They think we're going to come out of the hall again. Maybe we should lie low for another day?' Again, no response.

Irritated by her rudeness, he craned his head back around to say it again but there was nobody around to hear him. Shilan was gone.

'Stupid,' he snarled to himself, realising that she had decided to prove if the Yeti were still there by using herself as live bait. 'I hope you're as quick on your feet as you think. If they are there, you're going to need it.'

Lowering the roof, he felt for the Mauser in the darkness created by Shilan's exit, along with her head torch. His fingers found the door but the rifle was gone. He would not be able to help her now so he did the only thing he could; returned to his viewing point, lifted up the corner of the roof again and watched, waiting.

He did not have long to wait before he saw her, appearing at one of the open windows. Peeking her head around the wall, she surveyed the quiet scene for a few moments before committing herself to the test. She had no intention of being frightened by
what ifs
; she had to know.

Swinging one leg over the window sill, Shilan sucked in a deep breath and pushed down the rising sense of panic. There is nothing to worry about, she reasoned with herself. All she needed to do was show herself and give any hungry Yeti the chance to do the same. If nothing was there, she and Pace could make a run for the Lynx. If they were being watched, it was only a short run back to the safety of the trap door.

Shilan brought her other leg over and jumped down into the deeply disturbed snow. Not waiting; fearful that her own creeping doubts would get the better of her, she began to walk slowly out into plain sight. Ten steps, fifteen. Nothing. The Mauser was held tightly in her hands, held against her hip.

From under the corrugated roof, Pace's gaze burned fiercely into the tree line, expecting a monster to crash through foliage at any second. Yet everything remained calm and quiet; no sound at all.

As a relieved Shilan reached a point roughly ten metres away from the window, her own ears caught the faintest of sounds from the trees nearest to her. Only a rustle, but it stood out in the pervading silence. She froze. Pace still saw no sign of life from the trees. He was too far away to hear anything but spotted her stiffen into sudden immobility, his heart lurching into his mouth. As he watched, he saw her begin to lift the old German rifle towards her shoulder.

Shilan heard the sound again, this time more pronounced. Something was moving, very slowly, in the shadows within the tree trunks. She turned her head incredibly slowly towards the spot until her gaze settled upon a section of the tree line that looked identical to the rest. Nothing appeared different; just trees and snow.

Her mind raced furiously, fighting her own desperate instinct to flee. Intellect and reason tried to explain to her spirit that the sound might be a rodent, or a rabbit, but her soul was not buying it.

The third time she heard it, even more loudly, told her that she had made a terrible mistake. Not only was something there but this sound came from a different point, some ten metres further along the green line.

Shilan began to back up, as fast as she could. She made it a couple of steps before two huge shapes solidified out of the shadows cast by the outer trees, stepping into full, glorious, terrifying sight.

She did not stop of look at them closely; instead spinning on her heels and bolting for the window. Shilan should have crossed the distance within a couple of seconds but luck decided it was time to play a cruel trick, whipping her feet out from beneath her in a Hollywood cliché when she tried to accelerate too fast over the snow. Stumbling face first, still clutching the Mauser tightly, the clumsy restrictions on her snowsuit served to slow her movements as she struggled to get back up, slipping down onto her knees; heart threatening to explode with fear, the first time she tried. Finally, too late, she was able to lurch to her feet.

Taking huge strides, her pursuers were barely a metre behind her by the time she reached the window. She heard them coming, unbelievably fast, and now felt the heat of fetid breath on the back of her head. With Death sharpening his scythe over her shoulder, she flung herself bodily through the window, knowing she had no chance of reaching the stairs, let alone the safety of the tunnels, before they would be on her.

Shilan's neck tensed involuntarily against the savage sensation of an impending bite.

A lethal roar exploded in the darkness inside the hall; a concussive bark accompanied by a brilliant flash. Coming from in front of her, her confused brain struggled to comprehend how the creatures had beaten her inside or where the light had come from. Then the roar came again, once, twice, three times in quick succession, as a hand grabbed her roughly by the wrist and yanked her up off the floor.

Shilan allowed herself to be pulled across the room and was almost at the top of the stairs before reality unveiled itself to her.

'Faster!' yelled Pace. 'Come on, and watch out for those broken boards!' Turning to empty the final shot from his Webley back in the direction of the disoriented Yeti, he pulled her down the stairs and shoved her clumsily down the shaft, following immediately afterwards.

Three minutes later, both panting and smiling stupidly, they were back in their hideout.

'I think,' breathed Shilan, 'that I may have been a little rash.'

'You think?' Pace had seen events begin to unfold and done the only thing he could to try and save her. How he had managed to jump down the shaft, crawl through the tunnel, pull himself up the other shaft and reach her in the nick of time; taking the dusty steps three at a time, was a miracle. All he had was his pistol but he knew it was powerful enough, at very close range, to do serious damage to flesh.

'Thank you.' Shilan's pulse was slowing. 'You could have left me to my fate. I would have understood.'

'I was too late to save Hill. You, I could do something about,' he added matter-of-factly. 'Besides, if I've got to be stuck here for a while, at least I'll have company.' Pace forced a smile in the darkness, leaning over and fumbling at the back of her head until he found the switch that activated her head torch. Clicking it on, they regarded each other in the sudden brilliance, eyes blinking.

'They were waiting for us. All of them.'

'If that is all of them,' Pace wondered drily. 'They know we're here somewhere so they were staking out the hall.'

'They aren't nocturnal hunters then?'

'Perhaps, usually. They might just be keen to catch us so are hanging around, past their bedtime.'

'How long do you think they will stay out there, waiting?'

'That's the million dollar question,' replied Pace. He had tried calling Baker, on his satellite phone, a dozen times since entering the small hut but he was unable to get a signal out through the corrugated roof and surrounding snow drifts. He tried again anyway, to be rewarded by the same irritating beeping that told him he needed to try harder.

'If you lift the corner up high enough and I lean out a little, perhaps we could snatch a signal.' Shilan was impressed by the device Pace was carrying – top of the range, with a level of encryption she had never seen before, even in her own covert operations.

'Our only chance of remaining alive is for these things to not spot us. I've already risked enough by lifting the roof a few times. It would have to be raised a lot higher before we could make a call and they might spot the movement. Our scent, which is already pungent,' he added slyly, 'would definitely waft outside.'

'Do you have another plan?' she asked innocently.

'I was planning on slipping back into the hall and calling from there. I know I can get a signal from the upper storey. That was before you pulled your little stunt,' he said reprovingly. 'Now, we're going to have to wait a while before I try.'

'Sorry,' she stated, very unapologetically. 'At least we know they're still out there.' It was of small comfort.

They spent the rest of the day fitfully dozing on the floor, not attempting to lift the roof again and simply putting up with each other's rising stink. Days of sweat and unwashed dirt was only contained within their suits up to a certain point. Hot, stuffy and always listening for any sounds from outside, by ten o'clock that night, Pace was fit to burst with frustration.

They both made their way to the vertical shaft in the floor of the main hall, moving in the pitch darkness rather than risk showing any lights. They had no idea if the creatures were now waiting for them inside the building or whether they had retreated to the sanctuary of the thick forest. There was no sense in taking unnecessary chances, they had agreed.

Pace led the crawl while Shilan followed up behind him, gripping the Mauser. Waiting in the narrow tunnel as Pace stood up inside the shaft, they both listened apprehensively but heard no sounds from the abandoned old building above their heads.

The first thing Pace attempted was another call, hoping that he might be able to get a signal from the bottom of the shaft but, once again, the technology refused to co-operate.

In the room above, they waited expectantly, mouths dribbling at the delicious scent of the prey that was almost within reach. Huddled around the trap door, like hungry Eskimo fisherman patiently guarding an ice hole, waiting for a visit from a curious seal, the three massive bodies completely surrounded the hole in a wall of muscle and fur.

Down at the bottom of the shaft, Pace was straining his ears. The silence of the room above remained unbroken but to climb up meant committing himself to a leap and clamber manoeuvre, leaving him helpless to attack for a few seconds if there was anything nasty waiting for him up there. His nerves jangled constantly, warning him that all was not well but he wasn't sure it wasn't purely a reaction to accumulated stress and fear.

They had not discussed a Plan B but, on a whim, he paused for a second, kneeling down in the shaft to whisper to Shilan.

'Pass me the rifle,' he directed. 'Stay quiet. I want to try something.'

'Is there a problem?' she shot back. 'Are they up there?'

'I can't hear a damned thing but I'm starting to get a little spooked.' In the gloom of her damp tunnel, Shilan heard, more than saw, Pace strip off his snowsuit. Exposed to the frigid temperature in his jeans and sweat-stained tee-shirt, he was too busy to feel the cold for a moment but nearly gagged on the full release of his own body odour. If Shilan noticed the stench, she was too polite to comment.