Cibola

Chapter 30

At the far end of the chamber, the steps led to a simple doorway, so out of place amongst the splendor of the treasure that surrounded it.

“In the sepulchre, in the third course of stones,” Amanda read. “Is that a sepulchre?”

“In ancient Hebrew practice, a sepulchre was usually carved into the side of a hill,” Jade said. “Perhaps that’s what the simplicity is supposed to symbolize.”

Golden statues of Anubis guarded the door, each holding a spear. Bones paused for a closer look.”

“Hey! They come out!” he exclaimed, removing one of the spears and hefting it. “It’s heavy!”

“Put it back,” Amanda said, as if speaking to a child.

“You’re no fun,” Bones said, but he returned the spear to its proper place and followed her up the steps.

The chamber they entered was nothing more than a perfect square carved into the rock. Down the center of the room stood a line of seven piles of loose rock. Dane and Bones immediately set to moving the third pile of stones, and soon they uncovered a manhole-sized cross and clover disc. Together, they lifted it from its place and moved it to the side. Dane could hear the rush of water down below, and another sound he recognized immediately.

“Get out of here!” He shouted, pushing Jade toward the door and drawing the .22. A dark blur burst from the hole, snarling with unearthly rage. Dane pumped three rounds into the beast, but when it hit the ground, it turned toward him and tensed to spring. Before it could leap, Bones blew a hole in the back of its head with his Glock. They weren’t out of the woods yet, as two more of the beasts clambered out of the hole. Dane emptied the .22 into the first, then drew his knife, and backed up to the door, ready to protect Amanda and Jade. Bones put four rounds into the second beast, then moved cautiously to the hole and peered down inside.

“Here, kitty, kitty,” he called. No sound came from the hole save the steady flow of the underground stream. “Hopefully that’s it,” he said. “What are these things?”

In the light, Dane could clearly see the beasts for the first time. He squatted down next to the nearest of the fallen creatures. Amanda and Jade returned to the room, Jade clutching her knife and Amanda holding one of the Anubis’s spears. Amanda shrank back from the dead creatures, but Jade dropped down on the balls of her feet next to Dane.

The creature’s body was long and sleek, with a broad chest and a sturdy rib cage. It was hairless, its flesh a mottled, dark green and as tough as old leather, with a pronounced spinal ridge that jutted up like the plates of a stegosaurus. Its haunches were so thickly muscled that they reminded Dane of a kangaroo. The front legs were also short and powerful. Jade lifted one of the padded front paws and squeezed it, causing its wicked, black claws to extend, and retract when she let go. The head was vaguely catlike, save for the long snout, with oversized ears and large, black eyes. Its mouth was filled with razor sharp teeth, two of which extended below the lower jaw line like fangs.

“Chupacabra,” Bones whispered. “It’s got to be!”

“Choo choo. Justin was trying to warn me of the chupacabra. He must have seen one sometime, and it scared him enough to draw those pictures. Unbelievable.”

“So, do we go on?” Bones asked. “There could be more, and I don’t have many bullets left.”

“There could be more behind us as well,” Jade said. “I didn’t come this far to stop now. I vote we go on.”

It did not escape Dane’s notice that Jade was no longer taking the lead, but treating everyone as an equal member of the group. This was no longer her expedition, but a shared experience.

“Me too,” Amanda said. “Let’s finish this.”

Dane went feet-first through the hole, landing on a stepping stone inscribed with the symbol that had become so familiar. He was in the middle of a fast-moving underground river. Stepping stones like the one on which he stood were set at three-foot intervals in five rows running the length of the passage all the way to the end, where another arched doorway waited. He was about to hop onto the next stone when something caught his eye. He stopped himself at the last second, almost losing his balance and flailing his arms as he fought to keep himself from tumbling into the fast-flowing current.

“Are you doing some kind of bird imitation down there?” Bones called to him. “What’s the holdup?”

“There are stepping stones down here,” he called back. “But they’re not all the same. Some of them have the symbol on them, but some only have the clover. Pass the spear down here.” Bones handed him the spear, and he reached out and tapped the stone upon which he had almost leapt- one with only a clover. It sank beneath the surface, floating back to the top when he pulled the spear away. He tested his theory on another stone that had both the cross and clover on the surface. It held. But would it support his weight? Here goes nothing! Bracing himself for a swim, he hopped onto the stone. It held.

“All right!” He called up to the others. “Come down one at a time, and only jump on the stones that have the cross and the clover. Make very sure where you’re stepping. Got me?” He led the others on a zigzagging path through the river, testing each stone with the spear before moving on. Soon, he hopped out of the river to stand at the doorway.

“Beit Adonai,” Jade again read the inscription. “The house of God.”

Dane stepped through the doorway, and the spear clattered to the ground from his limp fingers.

The chamber was carved into the shape of the interior of a pyramid, and all its walls were gold plated, save the cap of the pyramid, which was natural stone. The light that shone down from that small section at the top, and up from the floor, was so intense that it set the entire space aglow with a flickering golden light as it reflected off the water and the shining walls. High above him, a golden chain hung from the capstone, supporting a platform, though he could not see what it held. Water poured down through the seams of the capstone as well, soaking the hanging platform and falling in a curtain that enshrouded an island in the very center of the pyramid floor. Through the haze of falling water, Dane could just make out a stone sarcophagus on either side of the island. The island seemed to beckon to him, and he continued, as if in a trance, along the walkway that led to the island.

Jade moved to the first sarcophagus, and ran her fingers across it. The lid was carved in the image of a woman of unsurpassed beauty. Her striking face and swanlike neck were reminiscent of the famed bust of Nefertiti. She was not rendered in the Egyptian style, with royal headdress and accoutrements, but as she might have truly looked, with long, flowing hair and simple garments.

“Nefertiti,” Jade whispered.

“And the other one?” Dane asked.

“Let’s see.”

The man on the lid of the other sarcophagus had the long face, prominent nose, broad cheeks, and hooded eyes of Akhenaten. His shoulders were narrow and his hips wide for a man, but nothing like the exaggerated images portrayed in art. Like Nefertiti, he was not rendered in his kingly Egyptian garb, but as a regular man. His hair was long and flowing, as was his beard. His slender arms lay folded across his chest, and in his right hand he gripped a staff engraved with Hebrew writing.

“The staff of Moses was reputed to bear the names of the ten Plagues of Egypt,” Jade said.

“So this is…” Bones said, his voice quavering.

“The mose,” she said. “Moses.”

“I have to see this for myself,” Dane said. He didn’t know why, but the compulsion was so strong that he could not help himself. He needed to see. “Bones, will you help me with this.”

“Dane, maybe you shouldn’t,” Amanda began. “I mean, it’s…”

“Babe,” Bones said, “this is the only man on earth who’s seen the dead body of Lucifer himself and lived to tell the tale. Amanda smirked, obviously assuming he spoke in jest, but Jade paled visibly.

They carefully drew back the lid. Dane peered into the stone coffin. There was no second, ornate sarcophagus, as was the Egyptian tradition. There were no mummified remains.

Moses lay in the bottom of the sarcophagus, his body somehow perfectly preserved despite the thousands of years.

“He looks like he could stand up and walk out of here,” Jade said, peering over the side along with Dane and Bones.

“Wrong testament,” Bones said.

Dane reached down and touched Moses’ staff. Unlike many of the legends, it was not made of sapphire, but of solid wood, polished to a high sheen. The Hebrew words were there, worked in gold along the length of the staff. The ends were capped in bronze, with the symbol of Aten etched in the top.

Amanda screamed and turned to see two dark-clad men burst into the room. They dashed across the walkway, the first clutching a military-style knife, the second holding the spear Dane had dropped. Bones brought down the first man, a powerfully-built blond man, with two well-placed shots. His final shot went wild as the man with the spear, a veritable brute of a man with dark-hair cut G.I. style and arms and legs like tree trunks, bore down on them.

Without thinking, Dane grabbed the closest weapon, Moses’ staff, and dashed out to meet him. The man thrust the spear at Dane’s chest, but Dane parried the blow and cracked his opponent’s elbow. It wasn’t much of a blow; enough to sting, perhaps, but the man hissed as if he had been burned. Dane pressed his momentary advantage, driving the larger man back. Staff met spear with crisp, sharp clacks. His opponent was not tiring, he was obviously in peak condition, but his inability to penetrate Dane’s defenses was clearly frustrating him, because he began taunting Dane, trying to distract him.

“You think you can win, little man?” He bared his teeth in a predatory grin. “Issachar has killed better men than you.”

“Does Issachar always speak of himself in the third person?” Dane shot back. The surreal nature of this entire experience gave things a dreamlike quality, and with it, a subtle feeling of unreality, as if nothing could harm him, no matter how reckless he might be.

“Funny man!” Issachar growled. “You’ll die whimpering like those pathetic beasts I killed in the tunnels. I ran out of bullets and had to strangle the last one with my bare hands.” His blows rained down harder, but Dane turned them with ease. A quick side thrust to the chest and Issachar gasped in pain. Now, clearly frustrated, he barreled forward, seeking to knock Dane down by main force, but Dane was too quick. He dodged to his right, swept Issachar’s feet from under him, and gave him a smart rap to the back of the head. The blow would have rendered a weaker man unconscious, but Issachar bellowed with rage and kicked out, catching Dane’s heel and bringing him down hard on his backside.

They both sprang to their feet, but once again Dane was quicker. As Issachar tensed to make an impaling thrust, Dane whipped the staff around with all his might, cracking Issachar on the right temple. Issachar screamed in agony, covered his face with his hands, and staggered backward. Dane pursued him, the staff whirling like a windmill. Issachar shrieked as each blow struck him. To Dane’s great surprise, everywhere the staff struck his opponent, angry boils rose on his flesh and slowly began to spread. Issachar drew his hands away. The festering sores now covered all of his exposed flesh. He cried out again, this time in sheer horror, and dove into the water. His cries trailed away as he vanished from sight.

“Most impressive.” Dane recognized the cool pressure of a gun barrel pressed against the base of his skull. “Very slowly, hand me the staff.”

Dane’s first reaction was to fight, but even the feeling of invincibility that still flowed through him was not sufficient to conquer common sense. The man, whoever he was, need only to pull the trigger to end Dane’s life. Careful not to make any sudden moves, Dane handed the staff back to his captor.

“Very good. Now, get down on the ground and put your hands behind your head.” Despite the circumstances, the man sounded completely at ease, as if he was accustomed to his orders being obeyed. Dane complied with the man’s instructions, lying face-down on the cold stone. With Dane no longer standing between them, the others finally got a look at the intruder.

“Mr. Zollinger!” Jade gasped.

“As in Jude Zollinger the bank president?” Amanda blurted.

“He’s also Saul’s father,” Jade said.

“I am all of those things,” the man replied, as if making introductions at a formal party, “but you may call me Elder.”