She moved through the bars of stone, crouched by the pool. “Not deep, fairly clear. Nothing in there I can see.” She glanced over at Sasha.

“All right.” Though she dreaded it, Sasha moved to the pool. “I don’t see anything, in it or from it.”

“Okay. Is everybody up for heading in?” She shook her head as Annika waved her flashlight in a circle, watched the beam.

“It’s—”

“Yeah, pretty.” She pushed up, and as Bran had already started back, the others followed.

The walls stood no more than six feet apart, but the roof of the cave rose until the men could walk comfortably upright. Noting Sawyer kept Annika close, Sasha decided she didn’t have to worry about their playful teammate.

“It’s bigger than I imagined,” Sasha said, and nearly jumped as her voice echoed.

Bigger, she thought, and darker.

The walls widened, offered two chambers.

“Which way?” Bran asked her. “What does your instinct tell you?” he added when she hesitated.

“To the right. But—”

“To the right it is.”

“Hold on.” Riley dug chalk out of her pack, marked the wall of the chamber. “Always good to know where you’ve been.”

The chamber opened, higher and wider yet. Stalactites, stalagmites, and the columns they formed when they met glimmered in the light in golds and reds and umbers.

“Like jewels,” Annika said.

“Different minerals in the stone.” Riley studied the area. “But I’ll give you pretty here.”

Sasha played her light over a column, moved to it. “You need to see this. It looks like a woman. Look, her head, shoulders, body, all beautifully proportioned. Her face—eyes, nose, mouth. It’s not painted or carved. How could the stone have formed this way?”

She stood, long, dark hair, lithe form in flowing robes. Her eyes looked down, as if watching them. One hand, lifted, gestured to the back of the cave. The other held a globe.

“No way that’s a natural formation,” Riley said. “It had to be made.”

“It’s not painted,” Sasha repeated.

“There are other ways.” Bran aimed his light where the figure pointed. “There’s a ledge there, and an opening above it.”

“I’ll go in, scout it out,” Sawyer began, then caught the movement. “Riley.”

“It’s what I do,” she reminded him, and boosted herself onto the ledge and through.

“Hell. All of us then. Stay close,” he ordered Sasha.

Annika went in behind them, glanced back at the stone figure. “I don’t like her,” she murmured as Sawyer pulled up the flank.

They crawled for about ten feet, where it suddenly occurred to Sasha she might be a little claustrophobic after all. Then Riley called out.

“Another chamber, and a big one. There’s a drop, about three feet.”

Sasha heard the scrape of boots on rock, then the thud of a landing.

“I’ll have you,” Bran said before he dropped lightly into the dark. With his flashlight showing her the way, he held up a hand for hers. “Relax your knees,” he warned her.

She took the leap, caught her breath.

Before Bran could turn to offer Annika a hand, she’d jumped down gracefully.

Not dark, Sasha realized, or not completely. A light came from somewhere, pale and slightly . . . off. But it showed her the size of the cave, the smoothed teeth of rock stretching toward the floor, the others that soared up from it. All red, she thought, all red as blood.

A weight dropped on her chest, and her head swam.

“Don’t.” She reached out as Riley approached a formation that resembled a raised table. “Don’t touch it. Dark deeds done.”

“Riley,” Bran said sharply. “Touch nothing.”

In silent assent, Riley lifted her free hand, playing the light over the table stone. “There’s writing carved here. Ancient Greek.”

“Bones. Human bones piled over here.” Sawyer turned from them.

“Can you hear them screaming?” Sasha fisted her hands over her ears. “The children. She craved the children. The youth. The innocence.”

“I’m getting her out of here.”

“Wait, just wait,” Riley snapped at Bran. “I can read this. ‘In blood taken. In blood given. So she may live, so she may rise. In the name of Nerezza.’”

As she spoke the name, came a stirring, the dry rustling overhead.

“Just bats. Don’t panic.”

Riley’s warning came seconds before the screams, and the dark flood of wings.

Instinctively Sasha covered her head and face, curled up to make herself smaller. She felt the spidery wings brush her hair, shuddered.

Just bats, she told herself. Just bats.

She gasped at the quick pain as something sliced her arm. Grabbing it, she felt the warm, wet flow of her own blood.

“They bite!”

“They’re not just bats.” Riley pulled a gun from the holster snugged at the small of her back. “Run.” She shot one flying toward her face, and the sound crashed through the chamber.

Echoed by another as Sawyer fired another gun.

Blood fell on the ground, splattered on the altar.

And the ground shook.

Bats circled, looking down with hungry, somehow human eyes.

She formed out of the dark. The black robe swirled around her, and her hair, dense as midnight, curled in sleek coils around her face.

The face formed in the stone, and she smiled with terrible beauty.

“I have waited.” While the bats swooped and squealed, she lifted her hands. In one she held the glass ball. “I have watched.”

Her voice rang over the chaos, over the ring of bullets, of shouts and screams. Armed with only her flashlight, Sasha swung out to defend herself, saw Sawyer pivot to take aim at a bat diving toward Annika.

In a liquid blur of movement, Annika flipped back, pushed off with her hands and sent the bat smashing into the cave wall with a powerful thrust of her legs.

“Your blood.” She stepped off a pedestal, bent gracefully to run her finger through the blood that had dripped from Sasha’s arm to the cave floor. “It is warm,” she said as she licked it delicately from her finger as she might a dab of rich chocolate or cream.

“Your power is strong and . . . tasty. Through your blood I will drink that power. Through that power the path to the stars.”

Trapped, fighting to avoid fangs, claws, wings, Sasha stumbled back only to find herself pressed against the wall.

Across the chamber, Riley shouted, fired. But the bullets passed through the figure walking toward Sasha.

Something gripped her mind, something cold and fierce. She fought to pry it loose, felt it give, just a little.

“Very strong.”

Now that same force, the cold and fierce, gripped her throat, cutting off her air. All she felt was her own fear, and pushing against it dark hate, bottomless greed.

“Come with me, and live.”

Lies. The mother of lies. Nerezza.

Something—someone—leaped out of the shadows. A sword flashing silver in the dim red light. It cleaved through the swarming bats, severing them. As if through water, Sasha heard someone shouting.

“Get out! Go.”

“Give me what I want.” Nerezza loomed closer. “Or I will crush you, and all you love.”

“Not today.” Bran shoved Sasha behind him. While she gasped in breath, choked it out again, he threw up both his hands. Lightning bolted from them, blinding white.

Nerezza threw up an arm to shield her eyes, and from her came a roar more beast than human.

“Get her out!” Bran shouted. “Get her out of here. This won’t hold long.”

The bats swirled up, reformed, and like a great winged arrow came at him. The swordsman thrust, hacked, sent severed bodies tumbling to the ground while bullets pierced more.

“Get her out.” Bran’s voice, ice cold, snapped out. “Get them all out.”

The swordsman grabbed Riley, all but tossed her into the tunnel. He caught Annika as she finished a series of flips that sent bats tumbling. “Go!”

“Get Sasha,” Sawyer ordered, and ranged himself beside Bran. “I’m not leaving you, man.”