Page 303 of Caelum

“You’ve got game, girl,” he replied.

“Maybe.” I schooled my features, robbing them of all amusement as I turned back to shoot a poker face the driver’s way.

I didn’t appreciate how he’d been glowering at us, and though I could empathize, he was supposed to listen to his leader and be on our side. Not make us feel like pieces of human trash.

Trash who’d literally been the ones to annihilate two-thirds of the world’s Ghouls.

So, the guy was lucky I hadn’t told him to suck it.

Folding my arms across my chest, I stared out onto the road ahead andsighed as Derinkuyu unfolded. I didn’t need the GPS to tell me we were almost there. Not after all the pictures Samuel had shown me.

There was an official entrance, but Samuel had discovered there’d been a landslide about eighty years ago in the area. He believed that if we traveled past the area of Derinkuyu that was known to the tourists, we’d potentially find another entrance Mother Nature had revealed.

In doing so, we had to pass a lot of ramshackle buildings that were scrawled with graffiti. It was remarkably like Hidalgo, truth be told. The same low-level poverty rubbing shoulders with angry people who thought writing on walls would ease their anger at the world.

What couldn’t be ignored were the bizarre rock formations that the region was known for. These spiky monoliths were like huge stalagmites. They blended into the face of the mountain at their back, shielding them from the eyes of their ancient enemies.

It was a sea of stone, broken up only by patches of terrain that had been farmed and black holes that were windows in the rock.

When we eventually came to a halt, I was relieved.

Though my body wasn’t as sore as it might have been if thegouillehadn’t softened my fall from the temple two days ago, being jolted around for hours on end was making me feel the burn.

I wantedterra firma.

Now.

When we climbed out of the vehicle, the other SUVs appeared and relief flushed through me as Frazer, Nestor, and Dre hustled over to my side. From the tension on their faces, I assumed they might have been arguing on the ride over, but when they greeted us, each of them finding a way to touch me, I saw the strain disperse and recognized that they’d disliked being separated from us as much as we’d hated it too.

Well, I could only speak for myself, but being back with my Pack definitely made me breathe easier.

“Now that we’re here, what’s the plan?”

It was the driver who spoke, and though he wasn’t glaring at us anymore, I heard his disdain and fought with the need to get in his face.

Today was not the day to be throwing shade my way—as Reed would call it.

I didn’t need his BS, nor did I want it.

There were bigger fish to fry, so wasting time and energy on him was stupid, but it didn’t make his attitude any easier to take.

Plus, it sucked that if we made it out alive, and were welcomed back toCaelum, it might not be with a hero’s welcome but with disdain and distrust.

Sure, Nicholas was now looking into what had happened that night and was looking for a traitor in the Academy’s midst, but as Dre would say, shit stuck. And he wasn’t wrong.

Ignoring the driver, I turned away from the cluster of men around the SUVs and stared out at the land ahead.

Samuel approached me, and really, this was on him. This was his plan, but I knew my input was important to the guys because my body was a walking, talking compass.

Not of my own making, of course. But that was neither here nor there.

“How far out is this from what most people call the underground city?” Samuel asked the driver, who was the leader of his six-strong Pack.

He and his brothers moved forward to join us at the edge of the ridge where we stood. They were as dark as him, but although they might have blended in as Turks, they weren’t. One was too light, another had blue eyes that were hidden by contacts, and the last looked more Hispanic. His coloring was like Nestor and Dre’s more than Eren’s, whose skin was just a hint darker. Like burnt papyrus rather than ripe olive.

“Not far. Under here is the tunnel that connects Derinkuyu with another cave system a few miles away.”

“When I looked online, I couldn’t see any mention of the landslide damaging the city,” Samuel replied.

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