Chapter 166

The trail of blood ended in a hole in the ground, narrow but not impossible.

Mom was right, she didn’t have much time left. I didn’t know whether to be happy about it.

I jumped to the bottom of the rock and stood over the hole. I had to hold on to a rock to keep from falling; suddenly I felt dizzy. This was it, the adrenaline said “enough.” Nika carefully climbed down and crouched a couple of rocks above my head, like a watchful eagle. You could see the greedy gleam of anxiety in her eyes; she held the semi-automatics with clenched fingers.

“Here we go,” I said to myself, the trace of the skunk smell reaching me bearably through the fabric impregnated with Toshi’s sweat.

I dropped into the hole and grabbed the edges before submerging myself completely, because I wasn’t touching the floor of the cavern. It was more than two meters deep, and it was so dark that nothing could be seen. I searched the walls with my feet, hoping that the passage would be as narrow