Ryan kept his arm tight around Krysty and took a quick head count before all light left them. Everyone had made it.
The dark water sucked away all vestiges of light from the flare and left them in darkness. Ryan hung on fiercely, riding out the fight the river was giving them so effortlessly. Though he tried not to consider it, he knew that it would only take one sharp rock to rip out the side of the raft.
Abruptly a light flared into life at the front of the raft, splashing against the cavern roof not more than two feet above their heads. In the forward end of the raft, Jak swung the flashlight he’d freed from his gear downriver.
Ryan shifted a little, rising but not getting too close to the low ceiling of rock. They were traveling fast; the way the water-worn limestone passed them above and on both sides told him that. The stone looked green in the yellow light of the flash, tracked in horizontal layers that showed years of formation. The rough edges announced the damage that had been done by the monster quakes and passage of water over the decades since skydark. It was possible that some of the cavern had been in existence even before the world had ended.
The raft continued to bob and jump, following the irregular path of the tunnel. Jak held the flashlight, shifting it to illuminate the way.
“How far before we slow down?” Ryan yelled to Hoyle.
“Don’t know. I never got on the water when it was like this.” Hoyle’s gaze remained transfixed on the dark water before them.
The tunnel took another twist, almost falling back on itself and causing the raft to ride high enough up on the side to slam into the low ceiling. When Jak got the flashlight turned in the new direction, there was barely enough time for any of them to register the sudden drop-off facing them before they were shooting through it.
Ryan’s stomach twisted in protest at the sudden feeling of weightlessness, then tried to pull through itself when the raft slammed back into the water.
“By the Three Kennedys,” Doc exploded, “I should not like to be forced to endure that inauspicious travail again!”
Ryan silently agreed, but he could tell by the lurch of the raft that they were already picking up speed. He watched as Jak brought the light around. The raft swung sideways slowly in current, pulled faster still by the river. For a moment it looked as if the river channel was widening and deepening.
Then the blank wall rose before them without warning. The water smashed up against it, cresting six or seven feet to the broken stalactites above it. Bats fluttered in the beam of Jak’s flashlight, bits and pieces of shadows startled from their resting places.
“Oh, shit!” Mildred exclaimed.
Then there was no more time. Ryan buried himself in the raft, drawing Krysty down with him. The water wasn’t filling the chamber, it was being drawn away completely underground. But he had no way of knowing how far it went. He had one brief hope that the raft might somehow manage to stay afloat on the river without being drawn into the undertow. If it did, there was a possibility they could wait out the time it took to drain most of the floodwaters from the river.
The raft smashed into the wall hard enough to jar Ryan’s teeth and his eyeball in its socket. He felt the pitch and yaw of the raft beneath him, then it overturned and started taking on water.
“Let go,” Krysty told him.
Ryan released her, knowing she was right. There was no way to stay together in the deluge. He squeezed her hand, then released her. He had time to suck in most of one deep breath before the undertow reached out for them and yanked them under. There was no way to fight against the pull. Concentrating on survival, Ryan went with it.
The chill of the river coiled around him, filling his senses with a rush of confusion. He spotted Jak ahead of him, the albino highlighted by a nimbus of weak yellow light from the flashlight he still held. The youth’s other hand was wrapped tightly in one of the equipment loops. Ryan didn’t know if the albino was hanging on to the raft on purpose or if he’d been trapped by it.