A policeman approached the scene, clearly suspicious of the activity. Did they have record that such work was to be performed? Men jackhammering into the ground? Xandria caught Cornelius’s eye.

Cornelius approached the policeman, launching into a heated discussion in Czech. He presented a document, which the policeman studied for a few minutes before handing it back. They shook hands. Everything was fine. The policeman waved, setting out in search of an offense more egregious than a few workers fixing a water main.

“That was close,” Agent Frank Jorgenson said, wiping the sweat from his brow.

“Stop worrying. Cornelius took care of everything during the flight.” Xandria watched the husky agent with a combination of amusement and frustration. He was already huffing hard, removing the rubble from the site.

The men continued ripping through the stone. It wasn’t long before they dug straight into a square metal plate about two meters wide. Xandria brushed away the inch-deep layer of gray dust covering the plate, revealing an image that made her gasp. Watching over her shoulder, Jorgenson shouted, “You’ve got to come see this!”

Everyone gathered around. The image was unmistakable. It was the same icon that each of them wore on their medallions: a coiled dragon.

“What are you waiting for?” Cornelius boomed. “Open it up!”

Jorgenson and Wynant jammed crowbars under the lid and tried to pry it away from the ground. After they exhausted nearly all of their efforts, the plate gave way, peeling up to reveal a narrow chasm plummeting straight down into the earth. Barber uncoiled a rope and dropped it into the space. “Next stop, hell,” he joked.

“Jorgenson, you go first,” Cornelius said. “I don’t want you slipping and falling on my head.”

“Thank you, Master,” the hefty man said, grabbing the rope and linking it onto his belt. He shimmied his way down into the hole, winking at Xandria as he disappeared.

Xandria went next. She dropped about ten meters before coming into a wider space. She touched down, and Jorgenson flipped on a flashlight. “It’s a tunnel,” he said. “Which way do we go?”

Xandria grabbed the flashlight from him and studied the illuminated map as the others landed in the room, turning her body to align it with a north heading. “This way,” she said, walking in the downward direction.

The others tagged closely behind as she scurried ahead. Barber put his hand out and traced the wall with his fingers. “It’s damp,” he said.

Cornelius seized his arm. “Idiot! This passage probably hasn’t been used for centuries. There’s no telling how unstable it might be.”

They pressed onward. While the tunnel was initially wide enough for any of them to stand fully upright, arms spread apart, little by little the hole was closing in on them. Before long, Xandria found herself stooped over, and not long after that, they were forced onto their hands and knees.