The sound of the grate being pried open was a shriek of tortured iron that echoed down the brick tunnel like the scream of a dying animal. Sparks showered down from the ceiling as a crowbar forced the heavy latch, illuminating the swirling dust in brief, angry flashes of orange.
Peter didn't blink. He lay prone behind an overturned sarcophagus, the stock of his MP40 pressed into the hollow of his shoulder. The cold of the stone floor bit into his stomach, a sharp contrast to the sweat that was now freezing on his back.
"Wait," Peter whispered. The acoustics of the crypt magnified his whisper into a hiss that seemed to come from the walls themselves.
The heavy iron grille groaned, then flipped back with a deafening CLANG against the flagstones of the church floor above.
For a second, there was only the square of dim light from the nave, framing the silhouette of a head in a round helmet.
"Teper!" (Now!) Peter yelled.
He squeezed the trigger.
The submachine gun bucked in his hands. The muzzle flash in the pitch-black tunnel was blinding, a strobe light of violence. He saw the helmet jerk back violently. The silhouette disappeared.
But the Russian army was not stopped by one man.
A dark object dropped through the square hole. It hit the stone steps with a metallic clank-clank-clank, rolling down toward them.
"Grenade!" Hanke screamed.
"Cover!"
Peter buried his face in the crook of his arm, pressing his body into the gap between the wall and the sarcophagus.
BOOM.
The explosion in the confined space was not a sound; it was a pressure wave. It felt like being punched in the ears by a heavyweight boxer. The air was instantly sucked out of the tunnel, replaced by a hot, stinging cloud of pulverized brick and nitrate.
Peter's ears rang with a high-pitched whine that drowned out all thought. He shook his head, debris cascading from his helmet.
"Report!" he croaked. He couldn't hear his own voice.
"Still here!" Hanke shouted from the darkness.
"They're coming down!"
Boots thundered on the stone stairs. Davai! Davai!
"Fire! Fire at the stairs!"
The five men opened up. The tunnel became a kaleidoscope of muzzle flashes. The tracer rounds from the MP40 and the Kar98 rifles ricocheted off the stone walls, buzzing like angry hornets. The first two Soviet soldiers who tried to rush the stairs were cut down, their bodies tumbling into a heap at the bottom of the flight, blocking the way for those behind.
The momentum of the assault broke. The Russians pulled back from the opening.
Silence returned. But it was a heavy, smoky silence. The air in the crypt was thick with dust and the copper smell of blood.
Peter checked his magazine. Half gone.
"Reload," he ordered, his voice echoing. "Count your rounds. We don't have enough for a siege."
"I have five rounds left," Muller whispered from the dark. "Five."
"Fix bayonets," Peter said. "If they come again, we use the steel."
He could hear the Russians talking above them. Their voices were muffled, distorted by the stone floor. They were arguing.
"Why don't they just drop more grenades?" Schultz asked. His voice was trembling, tight with hysteria.
"Because they want to clear the hole," Hanke said calmly. He was bandaging Klein's arm in the dark, his movements sure and steady. "They don't know how many of us are down here. They think we are a whole company."
"They will find out soon enough," Peter muttered.
He felt the breast pocket of his tunic. The paper was still there. The edges were sharp against his ribs. The Release. He had released Dolce, but he had not released himself. He was still tethered to this earth by the biological imperative to breathe one more minute, to kill one more enemy.
The air in the crypt began to change.
At first, it was just a smell. A heavy, oily stench that cut through the cordite. It smelled like a gas station on a hot day. It smelled of petroleum jelly and death.
"Do you smell that?" Klein whispered.
Peter sniffed. His blood ran cold. He knew that smell. He had smelled it in Stalingrad.
"Gasoline," Peter said. "They are not coming down."
"What?"
"They are not coming down," Peter repeated, scrambling to his feet. "Move! Back! Get back to the lower door! Now! Move!"
He grabbed Schultz by the harness and shoved him deeper into the tunnel.
Above them, at the top of the stairs, a nozzle appeared over the lip of the opening. It hissed—a sound like a serpent taking a breath.
WHOOSH.
The world turned orange.
A stream of liquid fire erupted from the nozzle, roaring down the staircase like a dragon's breath. It hit the pile of bodies at the bottom of the steps and splashed outward, a tidal wave of burning napalm that clung to the walls, the floor, the ceiling.
The heat was instantaneous and unbearable. It was a physical blow. The air in the tunnel expanded violently, pushing a wave of searing heat ahead of it.
"Run!" Peter screamed.
They scrambled down the narrow corridor, stumbling over the uneven floor. The fire was roaring behind them, a living thing that was eating the oxygen, chasing them down the throat of the crypt.
The light was blinding. The shadows of the running men were thrown long and distorted against the far wall, dancing like damned souls in a medieval painting.
"My back! My back!" Klein screamed.
He had been too slow. The splash of the fuel had caught the hem of his greatcoat.
Peter turned. He saw Klein stumbling, a wreath of fire climbing up his back. The boy was flailing, turning in circles, screaming a sound that was not human.
"Down! Get down!" Hanke tackled Klein, throwing him into the dirt. He used his own body, his own hands, to smother the flames. He beat at the fire with his bare palms, ignoring the searing pain.
Peter grabbed Klein's collar and dragged him backward. "The door! Get through the door!"
They reached the heavy wooden door reinforced with iron bands—the entrance to the inner sanctum, the tomb of the monastery's founder.
"Open it!"
Muller and Schultz threw their weight against the wood. It groaned, the rusty hinges protesting, but it gave. They spilled into the room beyond.
"Pull Klein in!"
Peter and Hanke dragged the sobbing, smoking form of Klein over the threshold.
"Shut it!"
They slammed the door shut. Peter threw the heavy iron bolt into place.
The roar of the fire was muffled, but the heat radiating through the wood was intense. The door was old oak, thick and solid, but fire was patient.
They were in the dark again.
Peter clicked on his flashlight. The beam cut through the smoke that had followed them in.
They were in a small, circular chamber. The ceiling was a low dome. In the center lay a stone effigy of a knight, his hands clasped in prayer, his nose chipped away by time. Around the walls were niches filled with bones—skulls stacked like firewood, femurs arranged in patterns.
It was a dead end.
"Klein," Peter said, dropping to his knees beside the wounded boy.
Hanke was already there. He had cut away the burnt wool of the coat. Klein's back was a mess of blistered red flesh and blackened skin. The smell of burnt meat was overpowering in the small room. It was a sweet, sickly pork smell that made Peter's stomach heave.
Klein was whimpering, his eyes wide and glassy. "It burns... Peter... it burns..."
"I know," Peter whispered. He took his canteen. It was empty. "Water? Does anyone have water?"
Muller shook his canteen. A sloshing sound. "A little."
"Give it to him."
Muller handed the canteen over. Peter lifted Klein's head and trickled the water over the boy's cracked lips. Klein drank greedily, coughing.
"Did I... did I drop my rifle?" Klein asked weakly.
"It doesn't matter," Peter said. "Rest now."
"I can't... I can't feel my legs."
Shock. The body was shutting down.
Peter looked at Hanke. The corporal's hands were blistered, the skin peeling from his palms where he had beaten out the fire. Hanke looked back, his face streaked with soot and sweat. He shook his head slightly. He won't last.
The air in the room was getting hot. The fire outside was heating the stone, heating the door. The "Furnace" had sealed them in.
Peter sat back against the effigy of the knight. He felt a terrible, crushing exhaustion. He wanted to sleep. He wanted to close his eyes and drift away.
But the letters burned against his chest.
He took out the packet of paper. He unfolded it carefully. The paper was warm. Not from his body heat, but from the air.
He shone the flashlight on the words.
I release you, Dolce.
He read the line again. It felt different now. Before, up in the church, it had felt noble. A grand gesture of self-sacrifice. Now, in this oven of a tomb, with the smell of his friend's burning flesh in his nose, it felt pathetic.
What did words matter? What did apologies matter when the world was made of fire?
"Read it," Hanke said.
Peter looked up. "What?"
"The letter," Hanke said softly. He was cradling his burned hands against his chest. "You kept touching it. Up there. And down here. Read it, Peter."
"It's... it's private."
"We are in a tomb, Peter," Hanke said. "There is no privacy here. Only truth. Read it. Please. I need to hear something that isn't screaming."
Schultz looked up from the corner. Muller leaned closer. Even Klein, breathing shallowly, seemed to turn his head.
They were waiting. They were a congregation of the damned, waiting for a sermon.
Peter swallowed. His throat was dry as dust.
"It is to a girl," Peter said. "In Verona."
"An Italian girl?" Muller asked. "Does she make pasta?"
"She sells peaches," Peter said. A ghost of a smile touched his lips. "And she argues about the price."
He looked down at the paper.
" 'My Dearest Dolce...' "
He began to read.
He read the apology for the silence. He read about the fear of infection, the need to keep her safe from the rot of the front.
He read the second letter. The apology for the future. The house with the red roof. The names of the children. Marco. Elena.
When he read the names, Schultz let out a small sob, but Peter kept going.
He read the final letter. The release.
" 'I do not want to haunt you... I want to be a memory... Do not wear black for me. Wear yellow.' "
His voice wavered on the last lines.
" 'I love you. That is the only thing the war could not kill.' "
He finished. The silence in the tomb was absolute. The roar of the fire outside seemed to have faded, or perhaps they had just stopped listening to it.
"That is beautiful, Peter," Hanke whispered.
"It is a goodbye," Peter said, folding the paper.
"No," Hanke said. "It is a proof. It proves we were here. It proves we were men, not just... this." He gestured to the skulls on the wall.
Suddenly, Klein gasped. It was a wet, rattling sound.
Peter crawled over to him.
Klein's eyes were open, staring at the ceiling. Staring at the stone dome that pressed down like the lid of a jar.
"Marco," Klein whispered.
"What?" Peter leaned closer.
"Marco," Klein said again. "Good name."
Then he exhaled. A long, shuddering breath that seemed to carry the last of the heat out of his body. His eyes fixed on a point beyond the stone.
He was gone.
Peter closed the boy's eyes. He sat there for a moment, his hand resting on Klein's chest, feeling the stillness where the heart had been beating a moment ago.
"He is gone," Peter said.
Muller made the sign of the cross. Hanke bowed his head.
Peter stood up. He felt a sudden surge of anger. It was a cold, hard rage that cut through the exhaustion.
He walked to the heavy wooden door. He put his hand on it. It was hot to the touch, blistering hot. The fire was still burning on the other side.
"They think we are dead," Peter said. "They think the fire finished us."
"Maybe it did," Muller said. "The air... it is getting thin."
"No," Peter said. He turned to face them. "We are not dying in here. Not like rats in a trap. Klein is dead. That is enough."
He shone the light around the room. He looked at the effigy. He looked at the walls.
"This is a monastery," Peter said. "Monks needed escape routes. During the Thirty Years' War, during the plagues... they always had a way out."
"Peter, these are just walls," Hanke said wearily.
"Look," Peter commanded. "Look for a draft. Look for a loose stone. Look for anything."
He went to the far side of the chamber, behind the effigy. The wall here was rougher, the stones uneven. He ran his hand along the mortar.
He felt it.
A tiny, almost imperceptible movement of air. Cool air.
"Here!" Peter yelled. "Bring the light!"
Hanke brought the flashlight closer. Peter pointed to a crack between two large foundation stones near the floor. The flame of a match held there flickered inward.
"It pulls," Peter said. "There is a tunnel behind this. A ventilation shaft. Or a drain."
"Can we move the stone?" Muller asked.
"We have to," Peter said. He unslung his entrenching tool. "We dig. We pry. We scratch with our fingernails if we have to. But we are getting out of this furnace."
He struck the stone with the shovel. Sparks flew.
"For Klein," Peter said, striking it again. "For Marco. For Elena."
He hit the stone with a rhythm that matched the beating of his heart.
Clang. Clang. Clang.
The sound of hope in the house of the dead.