He did his best, but even his arm had become sluggish. Suddenly he was moving fast as the rope pulled him along. Then hands were gripping him, hauling him over a rock shelf that sparkled with a dusting of hoarfrost. He was dragged out of the water, trailing ripples of rank sludge behind him. Strands of mist threaded through the still air all around.
“Congratulations. You made it. Welcome to hell.”
Callum swayed about on all fours, dripping steaming water and blobs of scum onto the rock. The intense heat permeating him made every movement painful, yet each breath of frigid air was a torment. He was desperate to get out of his broiling guard’s uniform. Torchlight fell on him and held steady.
“Hey, what the fuck?” his male savior exclaimed.
“What is it?” a second voice asked. Female.
“That’s a guard’s uniform. The bastard’s Connexion Security.”
“What?”
“No,” Callum said, or tried to. The glacial air just came out of his mouth as a loud wheeze.
A hand gripped the hair on the back of his head, forcing him to look up. “You a guard, dickhead? You fall through by mistake, huh?”
“No.”
“I’m going to make you wish this was hell!”
The kick caught Callum in the side of his torso, shunting him across the rock. He flopped onto his back. The torch beam was still on him, blotting out the people behind. He could hear a footfall. Then another kick slammed into his ribs. Pain stars flashed across his vision. He wanted to scream in fury but didn’t have the strength or breath.
“Throw him back in,” the female voice demanded.
“Yeah—eventually.”
Callum reached down to his belt, hoping his memory was good, that his hand was in the right place. Fingers protested every nerve impulse but slowly closed around the device’s grip.
“Gonna make you bleed,” the man growled. “Gonna make you scream. You’ll beg me to kill you before I’m done slicing you. I know how to make that happen. Oh, man, do I ever.” There was a flash in the gloom as the torchlight shone off a blade.
It gave Callum a target. He fired the pistol.
There was a furious screech that twisted off into agonized grunting. The man dropped to the ground. Callum could hear limbs thrashing about as the dart pumped electricity into his erstwhile tormenter.
“Shit!” the woman shouted.
Callum shifted around on the ground. The torch was a huge clue where she was. It was a massive effort to make his fingers respond, but he managed to fire again. Missed. The torch beam swung around, which gave him an indication of which hand she was holding it in, where her body must be. Then it was wobbling from side to side as she started running.
He fired again. She wailed as the dart struck, then fell. The torch tumbled away and rolled across the rock, ending up pointing out across the simmering water.
Callum rolled onto his back and squeezed his eyes shut for a long moment. “Holy fuck.”
The heat was abating—fractionally. He knew he had to get out of his sodden clothes. The armored jacket was easy to shrug out of. Vapor billowed off his shirt and trousers, fluorescing a vivid white in the torchlight. He stripped them off quickly but left the slim backpack in place. The sight of his skin, now a nasty shade of salmon-pink, made him grimace. But the cold was cutting into him now, almost as bad as the heat from a minute ago. He could feel himself starting to go numb.
“Where the fuck is this place?” he muttered as he bent over the man he’d darted. His victim was in his late thirties with a thick beard, wearing a heavy quilted coat and equally thick trousers, similar to the ones they’d put on Akkar and Dimon.
Callum claimed the coat for himself but let the man keep his sweater. Next prize were the boots and trousers.
Once he was dressed properly, he made himself sit for a few minutes, spending the time sorting through the equipment that was attached to Phil Murray’s stolen uniform. His abused skin was one giant itch, and he could feel his blood singing around his body as the adrenaline high gradually dissipated. As his heart calmed, he began to take in what had happened. The air was subzero and so thin he was clearly at considerable altitude, yet the lake he’d fallen into had to be a geothermal vent.
He stood up and walked over to retrieve the big torch. When he shone it on the woman, he saw an elderly lady with ebony skin and a mass of frizzy gray hair flaring out from under a dark wool hat. Her quilted coat was similar to the man’s, as were her trousers and boots.
He swung the torch beam back to the man. He’d left him his sweater, but his bare legs were turning blue, and frost was forming on them. “Ah, bollocks.”