Empire of Shadows (Raiders of the Arcana #1)

Thirty

As Adam set back out with the caravan that morning, the atmosphere was decidedly grim. Word had spread about last night’s attack. Bones, the foreman, had ordered Pacheco, Ram, and three of their companions to dig a pair of graves for the bodies of the slaughtered men.

It had been tough work. The ground was root-bound and rocky. Adam had picked up a pickax and strode in to help, Staines’s muttering complaints be damned.

He’d spent another ten minutes after that trying to scrub the blood from his shirt, and failing. He’d finally just thrown the ruined garment in the river and let the current take it.

It had been Aurelio Fajardo, of all people, who had given Adam a replacement. The muleteer tossed a spare at him as Adam walked past the corral. The shirt was a bit short in the arms—but since when had Adam bothered to wear his sleeves down?

Aurelio had answered Adam’s thanks with a disapproving grunt as he turned his attention back to his animals.

The delay imposed by the burials meant that the caravan didn’t get rolling until nearly half past nine. Bones drove them at a harder pace to try to make up some of the time. The men endured it in taciturn silence.

The ground grew steeper and rockier, wending along the ridge as they progressed. The air was thick, and the sky grayed with haze. The air remained thick and humid, despite the fact that they were gradually working their way to higher ground.

As the expedition halted for lunch, Adam eyed the rocky ledge that rose beside them and curved toward the south.

“I’m going to climb to the ridge,” he announced.

Staines startled.

“What do you want to do that for?” he protested. “There is perfectly nice ground right here.”

“I know,” Adam agreed—with feeling—as he eyed the high, steep slope. “But I should probably make sure we’re actually going where I think we are.” He shot a wry glance over at the guard. “Didn’t say you had to follow me.”

“Of course, I don’t have to follow you, you crazy bakra,” Staines retorted. “I could just shoot you instead.”

“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Staines.”

Adam turned toward the source of the reply.

Jacobs stepped from the trees.

Unlike Dawson, Jacobs hadn’t purchased a special wardrobe for their trip into the bush. He wore sturdy boots and plain trousers with a shirt and waistcoat that would have looked perfectly acceptable on a London street.

Also unlike Dawson, Jacobs was not perpetually covered in sweat.

“Your rifle,” Jacobs ordered, extending his arm to Staines without taking his eyes off Adam.

Staines handed Jacobs the gun without hesitation, eyeing him a bit like he might look at a tiger on an unreliable leash.

Jacobs swung the rifle over his shoulder and let it hang there. That he didn’t bother to point it at Adam felt remarkably like an insult.

“Lead the way,” Jacobs said, gesturing them up.

They climbed in silence. Adam supposed it was better than being forced to maintain a conversation. He focused on the landscape instead, picking out the most likely path up the steeply rising ground.

Which was fine—as long as all he did was look up.

Jacobs was barely breathing any harder, even when Adam’s route required them to scramble over the rocks, using both hands and feet to haul themselves upwards. The real boss of the expedition was clearly nothing like the soft, red-faced Dawson. Wherever Jacobs had come from, it was a place that bred men of a different ilk than his complaining, hive-stricken partner.

The man wasn’t doing a damned thing but following in Adam’s wake, and he somehow still made it feel threatening.

“I gather you agreed to assist the professor with securing the artifact,” Jacobs said.

The sound of his voice startled Adam—and immediately grated on him.

Had he? Adam cast his thoughts back to his conversation with Dawson the night before. He didn’t actually remember agreeing to anything… but then, he didn’t put it past Dawson to have stopped listening and simply assumed that everything was going the way he wanted it to go.

“What can I say?” Adam returned flatly as he found another handhold.

“I believe we may both agree that your assistance will be granted to the utmost of your ability without any additional complications?” Jacobs offered. He set his boot to the stones and followed adeptly.

Adam paused with his hands on the next boulder. He cast a slow glance back over his shoulder at where Jacobs climbed below him.

“Or you start cutting up my friend?” he returned coldly.

“Good,” Jacobs replied, easily pulling himself up another step. “I see we understand each other.”

Adam contemplated kicking Jacobs in the face. It would have felt great—but he had no doubt that Jacobs was carefully watching his every move, and the man still had the gun. Adam didn’t doubt that Jacobs knew perfectly well how to use it.

Adam might be prone to occasionally rash decision-making, but even he could see that those were lousy odds… and if he got himself shot, there wouldn’t be much reason left for Jacobs to keep Ellie around.

No kicking for now, Adam decided. He gritted his teeth and pushed on.

“I believe the professor may be considering whether you could be of longer-term use to us,” Jacobs continued.

Adam halted in his tracks to stare down at the other man in surprise.

“I’m sorry—What?” he blurted.

Jacobs didn’t stop. He stepped neatly up the rest of the winding trail, only stopping when he had come parallel to Adam.

“Dawson is looking for a way to avoid the aspects of his own duties he considers less appealing, of course.” Jacobs was not the least bit out of breath. “He dislikes enduring the outdoors—nor is he much good at it. I don’t believe anyone would be averse to replacing the professor in that capacity. Were you to show an interest in such work, it would certainly extend your usefulness. I am sure you have realized by now that your and Miss Mallory’s continued health depends on how long you remain… useful.”

Adam’s jaw clenched as he absorbed Jacobs’ revelation. It certainly made some sense of Dawson’s weird conversation with Adam the night before.

He recalled how the professor’s attitude toward him had shifted when Adam had first revealed that he’d attended Cambridge. He wondered if it would shift again if Dawson learned that Adam had walked out without a degree.

But Jacobs wasn’t bluffing. Adam knew perfectly well that he was only alive because Jacobs needed him. The minute that changed, both he and Ellie would be in serious trouble.

If Adam had been smart, he would have pummeled Braxton Pickett, reclaimed his machete, and made off into the woods with Ellie days ago. Sticking around in the hopes that they could find a way to prevent Jacobs and his companion from destroying whatever lay in this mysterious city was a hell of a lot more risky.

It might be slightly less risky if Jacobs believed that Adam was interested in taking over Dawson’s job.

Adam suppressed a groan. He was still fighting the urge to grab Jacobs by his waistcoat and start pummeling him—even though he was pretty sure he’d get stabbed someplace vital as soon as he tried.

But he also knew an opportunity when he saw one.

“You asking if I’m interested?” Adam said. He hopped down from the boulder he’d just climbed, landing solidly beside Jacobs in a dry streambed.

“Are you?” Jacobs returned.

“Sure,” Adam replied neatly.

As lies went, Adam thought it was a pretty good one—even for him.

Jacobs smiled. His dark eyes were unreadable.

“Thank you,” he said evenly. “That is most informative.”

Jacobs sounded a little bit like someone who had just confirmed something which he had already suspected. That should’ve been a good thing. An uneasy lurch in Adam’s gut said otherwise.

Jacobs turned away to continue up the trail with the rifle still slung casually over his shoulder… as though he knew that Adam wasn’t a real threat.

“Ah,” Jacobs announced from ahead. “I believe we have found your River of Smoke.”

He had stopped on the flat, truncated edge of a high rock outcropping. Adam climbed up to join him there—and then promptly wished he hadn’t.

Rows of dark green pines fell away from beneath the spit of rock, along with the ground. The trees and the meandering line of the caravan unwound far beneath Adam’s boots. Beyond that lay the broad, rolling sprawl of the mountains.

Adam’s head was floating. The distance from his brain to the ground seemed to grow, lengthening like a tunnel.

That wasn’t good.

In the back of Adam’s mind, some rational sliver of his brain was hollering at him—loudly and vociferously—to throw himself down to the ground and cling to it until the world stopped threatening to go into a spin.

Adam settled for taking a single, careful step backwards. The move brought the edge of the stones on which he stood back into view. That was slightly better, if still far from great.

The change in position at least allowed Adam to look at what lay before him, instead of succumbing to the urge to drop to his gut on the stones and hold on for dear life. He forced himself to study the view, even as a burst of queasiness jolted through his stomach.

The mountain range curved to the east in a thick barrier of dark forest punctuated by the occasional sliver of a tumbling stream. Directly to the south, a high cliff of pale gray stone broke through the wall of green.

The surface of the cliff was marred by a sinuous line of coal-black stone which spilled down the face of it like the frozen imprint of a long-dead waterfall—or a river.

Jacobs was right. They had found the last landmark on the map—the gateway to a lost world.

“Aw hell,” Adam exclaimed as he fought the urge to puke.

They rejoined the caravan at the base of the ridge. Adam carved an unerring route back to the slow-moving line of men and beasts.

Jacobs stayed with him until they passed the place where Staines shuffled along with the others. Then he tossed the rifle to the startled guard, tipped his hat politely to Adam, and strode up to the front of the line to confer with the foreman.

Adam watched his back uneasily the whole way.

Staines shuffled his gun. He jumped away from a nippy nearby mule, muttering a curse.

Charles Goodwin stepped neatly into his place. His lanky stride made it easy.

“I can’t tell if you look like you want to strangle a man or throw up on your shoes,” Charlie commented. “Go that well up on the hill?”

“We found it,” Adam reported bluntly.

Charlie glanced over at him.

“You don’t sound too happy about that,” he noted.

Adam caught sight of Ellie through the shifting bodies of the pack animals and men. She had turned on her mule to glance back at him, frowning as her gaze shifted between him and Jacobs.

She was almost certainly counting the minutes until the time when she could ruthlessly interrogate Adam about whatever had passed on the ridge.

Oh, not much, Adam imagined himself telling her. Just me guessing that Jacobs can somehow read minds and plans to kill us both the minute he and Dawson have what they’re looking for.

With effort, he tore his gaze from Ellie to return his attention to the friend who walked beside him.

“I’m afraid I gotta call in that underpants favor,” Adam declared flatly.

“Raass,” Charlie swore with a groan.