Page 81 of Reset

He made sure both boys were in front of them where he could keep an eye on them while still protecting Sarah. “Gimme the bag and iPad,” he told her.

She didn’t protest, just handed them over.

Ryan took her hand in his as they followed the teens. Sarah was moving slower than usual, so he matched his pace to hers and made sure the boys never got too far out of sight.

This tunnel was different from the ones they’d been in. The walls were made of old worn bricks, which were covered in colorful graffiti. There were the usual tags, but now and then they passed a genuine work of art. Although, he had to look twice at some of the subject matter: Satanic symbols and sex acts seemed to be popular, although so was Mickey Mouse.

Every now and then, they passed some discarded bones—all human—just lying against the walls. They were old, mostly broken, and had been left as litter in the passageways.

The Pit looked back over his shoulder and saw Sarah staring at a skull someone had tagged with their name using black marker pen.

“Macabre, non?” the teen said.

“I thought the bones were kept in the ossuary, but they seem to be everywhere,” she said, meaning the place where bones had been arranged into sculptural shapes in order to make them neater and therefore more attractive to the tourists. They loved to walk under the sign welcoming them to the city of the dead before taking selfies with pillars made out of skulls or walls built from thousands of femurs. Sometimes Ryan didn’t understand people.

“The bones are spread over all of the catacombs.” La Fosse grinned, showing a missing tooth. “Most of the ones in the passage you came through were once in these tunnels. The artists moved them over the years to make space for their work.” He waved a hand at a wall painted with the image of a horned man with a goat’s legs.

“Is that what you’re doing down here?” Sarah asked as she tiptoed past some smashed and broken ribs.

“Oui,” Le Chat answered. “We have the desire to be famous. Like Banksy.” He beamed back at them as La Fosse frowned.

“Not Banksy, he is a sellout.” He spat on the floor in disgust. “We will be true graffiti artists. We have no need for galleries. The world is where we show our art.”

“Do you want to see one of our works?” Le Chat asked eagerly.

Of course, Sarah was much too polite to say no. “I’d love to.”

Ryan bugged his eyes out at her, but she didn’t pay any attention.

“Here,” Le Chat said, waving his arm toward a painting on the right. “We have done this.”

Sarah turned pink when she saw it was a naked woman with massive breasts, surrounded by black cats. At least, Ryan thought they were cats. It was hard to tell. The only thing that was really clear was the breasts. And there was no need to guess who’d painted those.

“Oh, that’s…” Sarah seemed a little lost for words. She cleared her throat. “You have a lot of skill. I’m sure you’ll be very famous.”

The pair elbowed each other, grinning widely.

“We paint witches,” Le Chat said. “Because we are la féministe.”

“Witches have the women power,” La Fosse added, as though that cleared everything up.

“She’s a witch?” Sarah sounded a little strangled.

“See?” Le Chat pointed at a mark on the woman’s belly. “She has the pentagram. And of course, the cats.”

“I see,” Sarah muttered. Although, how she saw anything beyond breasts the size of beach balls, Ryan didn’t know. “Thank you for showing me your art. Should we carry on now?”

The teens didn’t move. “You want a photo with our painting and the artists?”

“I, uh, wish we could…” She turned to him, apparently out of reasons why they couldn’t.

“Don’t have enough battery, kids.” He held up the iPad. “Once this runs out, we’re in the dark.”

“A pity.” Le Chat gave a very Gallic shrug, making Ryan wonder if the French had the move wired into their genetics.

They didn’t say much after that, just concentrated on walking through the tunnel, which seemed to gather filth as they went. There was a used condom beside some pieces of bone, beer bottles, cigarette ends, and junk food wrappers. Ryan had to wonder why, if the artists had managed to clear out the bones, they couldn’t pick up after themselves too.

When the tunnel was wide enough, he wrapped an arm around Sarah and let her lean on him. It was clear she was exhausted and running on fumes. They’d been underground for days, with only two cereal bars and some raw mushrooms to keep them going.