Falling Down by Guillermo del Toro

Author:Guillermo del Toro [Guillermo del Toro & Chuck Hogan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-07-01T07:00:00+00:00

Through the archway, the ruins comprised concentric stone walls. Curving, crumbling in places, they rose as high as twelve meters, averaging closer to eight. Forbiddingly tall and eerie.

Liev examined the stone by flashlight while the others watched for trouble. “Black granite,” he said. “See the lichen on the base? Damn old.”

“Centuries old,” said Daniil, the medic, looking over his shoulder. “Even older. There’s a word for a place like this . . .”

“Could someone have quarried granite here?” said Liev. The answer seemed to be no. “How would they transport so much stone this high up a mountain?”

A moan startled the operators—but it was Oleg, squirming on the dented door to which he was tied.

Daniil said, “Maybe there’s a dry area, some cover, where I can treat him.”

Liev pulled his eyes away from the weathered black stone.

The next curved wall, slightly lower, was ten meters ahead. They followed it to the right, soon coming upon another archway.

Liev noted that there was considerably less snow in the first, outermost ring of the labyrinth than outside the ruins—and less still in the second ring. The air was no warmer, but the floor was strewn with chunks of wood and desiccated leaves. Almost no snow accumulation here. Just black, dead earth.

Liev pointed out this fact to Daniil. “Cherno,” he said.

Black.

Daniil said, “How can this be?”

“Why build a maze all the way up here?” wondered Radimir, the bearlike mercenary, scanning the premises with his rifle.

Liev touched the stonework of the archway as they passed through it. “Maybe there were gates or doors here at one point.”

Moving leftward this time, following the second curved wall, they discovered another archway. More cautiously now, Liev signaled Avva and Timur, who did a tactical entry, crouching low and fanning out in either direction with their assault rifles at the ready.

Both brothers called back, “Clear!”

Their voices echoed strangely. Inside this third ring, the mountain floor was devoid of snow or even dead leaves. Wind swirled about them like voices whispering in ancient languages, but the ground was remarkably clean—as much as they could see in the settling darkness.

“A tumulus,” said Daniil suddenly. “The word I was looking for—an ancient grave in honor of a fallen great. A warrior or some notable.”

“It’s a labyrinth,” said Liev. “Maybe they were trying to slow down a charging enemy. Defend the core while the attackers negotiated their way in. Trying to keep them out.”

Yuri leaned against the wall and recoiled fast. The others turned. Barely visible against the dark stone, rows of spikes hammered out of dark iron jutted from the stone, pointing inward toward the center.

“Or maybe,” said Daniil, “they were trying to keep something in.”

Liev shivered, feeling a tightening of his upper torso and throat. He couldn’t shake it off.

“Anybody else having trouble breathing?” asked Yuri, his voice barely a hush. “It’s not the elevation. And our voices . . .” The acoustics were odd and distorting, his words clipped and flat, but taking on a subtle echo, each one repeating as the next was spoken.

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