The Emerald Key - By Christopher Dinsdale Page 0,85

the third when a movement caught his eye. Much to his disbelief, a hand suddenly appeared from the pipe that was quickly filling with rushing water. It reached out and grabbed on to the ladder next to the opening. A second hand swung around and wrapped its fingers around a different rung, while somehow still holding on to a gun. Wilkes, drenched and exhausted, pulled his body out from the frothing current.

Stunned by the turn of events, Jamie left the gates and ran along the side of the lock, keeping away from its edge so that Wilkes couldn’t see him approach. When he was within arm’s reach of the ladder, he removed the leather satchel from his shoulder and lifted the flap. Eyes closed in prayer, Jamie took the ring of the Brotherhood off his finger for the first time since receiving it years ago and placed it, along with the book and his brother’s ring, in the satchel. He put the satchel on the ground, and then crept to the top of the ladder and waited.

First a hand and then Wilkes’s head appeared over the stone lip of the lock. Without a moment’s hesitation, Jamie lashed out with his foot and crashed it into Wilkes’s wrist. Wilkes screamed in pain as the gun went flying into the flooded lock below.

Before Wilkes could get himself off the ladder, Jamie lashed out again with his foot, catching Wilkes on the shoulder. Wilkes felt his shoulder explode in pain, but this time he was prepared for the attack and on contact, he wrapped his arm around Jamie’s leg. Jamie wasn’t expecting such a quick move, and he stumbled off balance toward the edge of the lock. Trying to stop himself from being thrown into the water below, Jamie made a desperate grab for the top of the ladder, reaching out with his left hand. He swung off the edge of the lock and caught the ladder, but his momentum carried Jamie out over the water and swung him about in a big arc. He grabbed the far side of the ladder with his other hand and buried his two knees hard into Wilkes’s lower back. Wilkes howled in pain as Jamie tried to scramble up his attacker to reach solid ground. Enraged, Wilkes swung a fist up and over his head, which connected squarely with Jamie’s jaw. Jamie felt his head explode as the fist smashed his jawbone. Jamie lost his grip on the ladder and in desperation, grabbed on to the only thing he could, Wilkes’s coat. Wilkes, hanging on by only one hand, couldn’t handle the sudden weight on his back and his remaining hand slipped off the ladder. Together, Wilkes and Jamie fell with a tremendous splash into the bottom of the lock.

Lying on their backs and gasping for air, the two men were swept into the pipe by the raging current. Both were momentarily stunned by their predicament as they were swallowed up by darkness. Their bodies accelerated down the slippery metal tube. Jamie’s only advantage over Wilkes was that he knew what was coming. The sudden drop would be upon them in a second. He only had one chance. Catching Wilkes by surprise, Jamie clawed and crawled like a madman over Wilkes’s body, pushing him ahead in the water, while Jamie fell in behind. Before Wilkes could respond, they hit the edge. The bottom of the pipe seemed to drop out from under them as the two men were sent into freefall with the gushing water. Like bullets from a gun, the men accelerated down the tube until the pipe suddenly levelled off. Jamie braced himself. He curled himself up into a ball, praying that Ryan’s plan would work.

Wilkes screamed in horror. A giant paddlewheel suddenly materialized in the gloom, its blades briskly spinning in the torrent of rushing water. Wilkes’s legs were the first to emerge from the pipe and then disappear under the paddles, the bones in his legs snapping like toothpicks. The waterwheel then crushed its way up his body until it reached his chest, grinding to a halt, impeded by the sheer mass of his body. Wilkes managed a final gurgle as water sprayed out in all directions, searching for a way around the human obstruction. Jamie came next, crashing hard into Wilkes’s pinned head and shoulders. Jamie, too, was caught in the torrent of water, his body thrown up against the stationary waterwheel and pinned there by the sheer force of the