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“Are you all right?” he asks.
“Yeah, you?”
“Yep, but we need to get out of the water. I think I can pull myself out and then drag you up.” He places my hand on the protruding boulder of rock he’s clinging to. “Hold on to this.”
I hear more splashing noises and feel Logan’s body slither past mine like a giant eel. Once he’s safely on solid ground, two strong arms I’m becoming too familiar with descend on me and pull me up.
Shivering, I ask, “What do we do now?”
“We must follow the river; it’s our best bet to get out.”
“Okay, but let’s use the lighter, I can hold it and flick it on from time to time. I’m not looking forward to another freezing bath.”
I hear Logan’s movements as he searches for it and tries to turn it on. “It’s not lighting up.”
“What do we do now?”
“We still have to follow the river.”
“What? In the darkness? How are we not going to fall in again?”
“I think it’s safer than trying to swim our way out. We’ll go slowly. I’m sure we can make it.”
And just when I thought the situation couldn’t get any worse, I discover that being soaked head to toe definitely isn’t an improvement. As we start down the tunnel again, we both drip unpleasantly, making the way even more slippery and treacherous.
Slowly, utterly exhausted, we stumble ahead for what seems forever, but could be only minutes.
Suddenly Logan stops, and I bump against him.
“Look!” he whispers. “Am I starting to have visions, or is that light?”
I strain my eyes, squinting in the darkness… and, yes, far ahead of us, I can definitely make out a faint, glimmering spot, no larger than a cottage windowpane. It’s so dim and distant, that I, too, doubt my sight. I close my eyes and open them again, but the dot is still there. Very much real.
Squeezing Logan’s hand, I say, “I can see it too!”
With a gasp of hope, we push on. In five minutes, there’s no longer any doubt; it’s a patch of light, becoming larger with every step we take. A minute more, and a breath of living air fans on us. We struggle on, now keeping to the left, as close to the tunnel wall and away from the running water as we can. It becomes easier as we go on and the passage expands.
A few more steps and we’re out in the sun again.
14
LOGAN
After so many hours trapped in that tomb, the first gulp of fresh air that fills my lungs is the sweetest I’ve ever tasted. I turn to find Winter beaming up at me in the faint light of the approaching dawn. She’s wet as a drowned rat, smeared all over with dust and mud, bruised, the fear of certain death still visible in her eyes. And yet, I’ve never seen a more beautiful woman in my entire life.
I smile back at her. “We made it!”
Winter surprises me with a high-five, and then undoes her tresses and shakes the water off, wet-dog style. I’m positively hypnotized.
“Where are we?” she asks.
I check our surroundings, trying to orient myself. We’re on a hill, the mass of the temple at our backs, and a stretch of untouched jungle expanding before us in a huge valley.
“We must’ve gotten out the other side of the temple,” I say, taking a better look at the vale opening below us.
That’s when my brain clicks.
The memory of the satellite images superimposes with the planes and hills before my eyes, turning rises into buildings and the flat stretches of ground into roads and plazas.
