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Thirty-Four
Adam hiked upthe pass under a sky turned to heavy gray lace by the soaring branches of old-growth teaks.Two rambling peaks framed his way while clusters of wildflowers and ferns whispered around his boots.
He was under armed guard.He had lost his dog.Two of his best friends were buried alive in a thousand-year-old stepwell.
All in all, he felt like hell.
His fear for Neil and Constance was only moderated by the strength of his determination to go back and dig them out.He wasn’t bound, and he still had his knife.Both of those things helped his odds, but he also stood in the middle of a platoon of capable soldiers.If he tried to make a run for it now, he’d be shot down or tackled before he could take two steps.
He didn’t doubt that he could find a way to get loose later.He just wasn’t sure what he would have to leave behind when he did—or what staying alive in the meantime would cost him.
Ellie stayed close, clearly shaken by her encounter with Jacobs.Adam was shaken by it, too.He had always known the man was dangerous, but his attack on Ellie had felt like a different kind of violence—one that wasn’t remotely purposeful or controlled like all the rest of his actions.
Ellie had said that she had been poking at the truth behind Jacobs’ mysterious quest for justice.That she thought she had started to get close to it when he attacked her.
Adam guessed she was probably right.
Bruises darkened the skin of her throat.The sight of them made Adam want to hurt someone—not that he was in any position to do it.Instead, he was pretty sure he owed it to Dawson of all bloody people that Ellie hadn’t actually been throttled to death.
Adam wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
Dawson trudged along ahead of him.Every now and then, the professor cast a huffy glare over his shoulder.He obviously felt betrayed to discover that Adam hadn’t really been his friend.
Adam didn’t feel too bad about that.
Jacobs trailed behind.Adam tried not to look at him.If he did, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to resist going back there to pummel the man—and then his situation would get even more damned complicated.
They neared the top of the pass, and Adam pulled his compass from his pocket.
It had been elegant once, a gentleman’s accessory sheathed in gold and beautifully engraved.The gold was scratched and battered now.Rust showed at the hinges.Adam should have sold it off to a jeweler and bought himself something more practical a long time ago.
He still wasn’t sure why he hadn’t.
He flipped it open and stared at the inscription inside the lid.
To A.May you always know your path—GB
Adam pushed the words from his mind and focused on calculating their distance from the stepwell where Neil and Constance were waiting for a rescue.
Three miles.Thirty degrees southwest.
He snapped the compass shut.
An odd hiss rose through the whispering of the trees.The sound was familiar, though Adam failed to place it.
He scrambled up the last stretch of the climb and stared down into another world.
A deep, ragged gorge lay below him, framed by soaring cliffs of ocher stone.A massive silver curtain raced down the face of the steep bluff at the far end, feeding the turquoise waters of a quick-moving stream that curved through the base of the ravine.
The waterfall was alive with the flood of the monsoon.Flowering vines hung around the cascade, clinging to irregularities in the cliffs.
It was achingly beautiful… and decidedly strange.Dark openings peppered the walls of the gorge like the hives of some insect—except that they were Adam’s size and clearly made by men.While some of the holes were simple ovals that almost looked natural, others were carved in rectangular lines, framed by false door jambs or shadowy colonnades.
“Rock-cut chambers,” Ellie breathed with an air of numb wonder as she stopped beside him.“It’s like the ruins at Udayagiri or Barabar.Probably a monastery or ashram.These should all lead to residential cells carved from the rock, interspersed with temple structures.”
Her brain hauled up more details from her reading.“There’s an ashram in the Ramayana—Valmiki’s ashram.Sita is sent there after Rama exiles her from his court… but that was supposed to sit on the banks of the Ganges.”She straightened, grasping Adam’s arm.“Only Sita didn’t stay there.Valmiki sent her to live with a group of female ascetics, somewhere secret and safe.That’s what this must be.It’s Sita’s ashram.That’s where Tulsidas has been taking us!”
