She tried to catch her breath. Her heart was racing. She was exhausted and dehydrated. She grabbed two handfuls of hair and screamed in frustration. Her cry dwindled down to a drawn-out squeak when she noticed the wall at the end of the pit.
There were no scorpions pouring out. They were only collecting around her here, and there was just enough of a path for her to make it to the opposite wall.
She leaped onto the wall, using the fist-sized holes as hand and footholds. She hoped there weren’t any stragglers — any scorpions waiting for an easy snack.
If any were inside the holes, she didn’t want to give them time to rush forward and stab her. She moved as fast as she dared — falling back to the floor now would mean
She scaled the wall.
About halfway up, she stopped, hearing something odd.
Something skittered toward her.
It was coming from the hole directly in front of her face. As she listened, she heard more skittering. More sounds of rushing little legs, scrabbling to get out of their dark holes in search of a meal…
“
She turned and looked up at her brother. The look on his face told her he had heard it too.
“Zahra —
She did, aiming for the nylon cord of her grappling hook. It dangled beneath his feet, beckoning her along. As soon as she completed the move, a stream of man-killers came spewing out of the hole where her head had just been. All the holes were now teeming with scorpions.
Zahra caught the line and gripped it as hard as she could. She was immediately yanked skyward by Baahir, Rabia, and Ali. Their combined strength was enough to get her up to the edge.
One by one, they released their hold on the cord and grabbed Zahra. Baahir gripped her jacket near her shoulders, Ali snagged a sleeve, and Rabia reached around and latched onto the back of her belt.
The group, Zahra included, fell onto the landbridge after one final pull.
Zahra didn’t move. She did nothing but lay there, staring at the ceiling and trying to catch her breath.
“I found… Feroz,” she said, huffing hard.
“You did?” Baahir asked, sitting up.
“Yeah,” Zahra replied. She lifted a shaky hand and pointed back into the pit. “He was down there.”
Baahir’s nose wrinkled up in disgust. “What a way to go.”
“Yeah, that’d be pretty awful.”
She sat up, and accepted Rabia and Ali’s offered hands. They slowly helped her up. Rabia didn’t let go until Zahra proved she could support her own weight. She gave the sniper a nod and tested her legs. Like everything else, they were sore and felt like gelatin.
Zahra prodded her lower back and thrust her hips left and right, audibly realigning the vertebrae. She took a deep breath and looked over her team.
“Thank you,” she said, making eye contact with each of them, “all of you.”
Rabia stepped up next to her and placed her hand on Zahra’s shoulder. “You aren’t getting out of this
The trio headed for the exit tunnel.
Zahra spun and lifted her arms. “Who said that was easy?”
Everyone shared in a laugh. It felt good to laugh.
Zahra stepped over to her grappling hook and began to reel it in. Something felt off.
“Dammit!” she yelled, vigorously whipping the cord back and forth. Once all the man-killers were knocked free, she quickly pulled in the rest of the rope. Then, she gave herself a moment to catch her breath, and her hands found her knees.
“What was that all about?” It was Baahir.
She unfolded her spine and turned. Everyone was staring at her like she was a crazy person. Apparently, they hadn’t seen what was coming.
“If I didn’t hate bugs before, I
The path beyond the archaic laboratory was long and winding, and the walls enclosing it sported the same kneeling figures as the trap room. There must have been tens of thousands of them. Whether it was Anubis himself who had decreed the art be made, or not, it was an impressive sight. Maybe the craftsmen were even members of the Ayad clan? Was this where his bloodline began?
That intrigued Khaliq. Hopefully, there would be answers up ahead.
His flashlight flickered, stopping him in his tracks. Without the aid of artificial light, Khaliq’s mission would be nearly impossible. He waited for the beam to dim again, but it didn’t. Satisfied that it had been nothing more than a blip, Khaliq continued his search.
He spotted an opening in the right and left-hand walls up ahead. He slowed and aimed his light into the room. It was small, maybe half the size of the room with the traps in it. Khaliq ducked inside the low opening and discovered the space to have once been living quarters. There was ancient furniture scattered around, most of which was broken and long rotted away.
