Chapter 114
The tunnel opened up into another large cavern, but this one did not appear to be bored through the rock. Rather, it appeared to be a natural cavern. Stalactites and stalagmites reached for one another; she was never sure which was which. The cave was cast in a strange orangish light that seemed to be coming from the ground, though Jo didn’t see any lights. Vampires were tricky creatures, though. Who knew how they’d managed to make the room look illuminated without actually putting in a light fixture.
As if the light situation wasn’t odd enough, across from them, fixed into the rock face of the cave wall was a door. A black wooden door with no windows. Just a solid black door with a brass knob. It was the strangest thing Jo could ever remember seeing--and that was definitely saying something because she’d seen a lot of crazy shit.
“Do you think that's….” Zane began, but he didn’t need to finish.
“I mean… wouldn’t it have to be?”
“Do you think we should knock?” he asked before turning to give her a goofy grin that confirmed what she already knew, that he was kidding and knew better than to knock on the door of a Vampire Queen’s boudoir.
Zane approached the door and turned the knob. It was no surprise that it was locked. Jo hoped they’d be able to push their way through without having to use any weapons, but after throwing their shoulders into it a few times and kicking at the lock, it became clear they’d need to try something else.
“Grenade?” Zane asked.
“Damn. I wish Cassidy was here so she could just blow it down,” Jo muttered. “Or Brandon’s bazooka.” Cass opening the door would be quieter, whereas the bazooka would potentially hit anyone that might be waiting for them. A grenade would just be loud and messy.
Seeing no other option, Jo pulled a regular grenade from her belt, not a silver one, and the two of them backed up to a distance that should’ve shielded them from any shrapnel before Jo tossed the sucker and they turned their heads away to avoid shards of wood in their eyes.
With her eyes closed, it was easier to see what was going on with everyone else. It looked like a few of the other pairs were nearly to the wider hall they’d just exited. She knew they wouldn’t be coming this way, though. Not with other halls to explore. There was a chance she was wrong.
The explosion didn’t rock the floor, but it was loud, and a few shards hit them, but not enough to hurt. Once the smoke cleared, Jo saw that the grenade had done a decent enough job that they’d be able to get through, but it hadn’t completely taken out the part that was keeping it locked, so they should be able to swing the shell out of the way.
If they’d chosen the correct hallway, and Holland was really down here, Jo fully expected an onslaught of Vampires and Assassin Hunters to come pouring through the door, but as she moved to pull it open, the hall on the other side was empty.
It was a hallway, though. With a ceiling and floor and walls--not a cave tunnel. There was a row of lights on either side of the hall, alternating every ten feet or so down a hallway that seemed to stretch on forever.
“I can’t decide if we are running into Wonderland, Oz, or… Dante’s Inferno,” Zane said as they took another glance around the cavern before moving into the hallway. There were no other exits in the large room, at least, not that she could see. They didn’t have a choice to make at the moment. On to Narnia it was.
The floor was a slick marble, and as they ran, Jo found herself sliding from time to time. The floor also seemed to be angled, so that they weren’t just going further into the interior of the mountain, they were going down.
Perhaps it was Dante’s Inferno after all.
At the end of the hallway, there was another hall, perpendicular to this one, and all along it there were rows of doors, all of them the same as the one they’d just blasted through.
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” Jo said, shaking her head. They were supposed to guess which door was Holland’s? Meanwhile, who knew what might be pouring out of the other doors.
At the far end of the hallway, Jo saw a door that looked very different from the others. Around the exterior, there was gold leaf on the paneling. It seemed quite obvious that this room was meant to be for the queen. Why else would that be there?
“What do you think?” Zane asked her.
Jo shook her head. Before she could even understand why, she said, “That can't be it. That can’t be the one. It’s too easy.”
“We could use our X-ray vision to try to get a sense of which one it is,” Zane suggested.
Jo had never cared for that particular weapon from her arsenal. “Yeah. We could… or….”
She turned to the left and headed down the hall, away from the door with the gold leaf.
Her feet were moving again before she really knew why. Her gut was just telling her that this was the right way. She’d always had an internal reaction to Vampires being close by, and it only made sense that she would know when she was getting closer or further away from the Vampire Queen.
The door at the far end of the hallway was calling to her. If the door on the right was a trick, then it just made sense that Holland’s actual room would be as far away from that one as possible so that she would have plenty of warning that she was being infiltrated.
She had to know they were there by now, anyway. Whoever had released those assholes to shoot at them would’ve told her that they had guests. Why would she just stay in there and wait for them to find her?
Unless she was fairly confident that she could annihilate anyone who came her way.
Jo hadn’t forgotten what the bitch had done to Cassidy, and her aunt was far more powerful than Jo was. Standing outside of the Vampire Queen’s room with only one Guardian and a few silver nitrate grenades, Jo felt like she was Daniel with his rock and a slingshot facing Goliath’s bigger, older, meaner brother.
There was absolutely no way she could do this.
Jo raised her hand and knocked on the door. “Holland? Are you in there?”
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