deadly traps.”
“Then I hope he’s better at this than you are.”
Caleb glared at her, then turned his attention back to the soldiers brushing away at the wall under Renee’s supervision. He wasn’t sure which woman he was angrier at right now-Renee or Qara. But then, of course, he couldn’t forget Nina. It seemed, all in the course of this single day, his wife was snatched from him and cruelly the gods put in her place three heartless substitutes.
“Found it!” Chang yelled, pointing. “Outline here, a small door. Do we push? I see no other mechanism.”
They all looked at Qara, who merely shrugged. Caleb walked over to Phoebe and Orlando. And silently, as if communicating telepathically, they each lowered their heads, closed their eyes and willed themselves forward in space and backward in time, searching, seeing.
“I’ve got it!” Orlando yelled, clapping his hands for the want of a game-show buzzer. “Just push anywhere along the right edge and it’ll swing inward.”
“And beyond the door?”
“A staircase,” Phoebe said, rubbing her temples, feeling like a sudden migraine just bored through her skull. “Leading down to what looked like a fancy golden crypt.”
Renee’s face brightened. “We’ve found it!” And she quickly ordered her men to open the door and light the way.
“But-” Caleb started to ask, then kept his mouth shut.
Phoebe also didn’t share the others’ enthusiasm. She looked at Qara and then Caleb. “I didn’t see this the first time. I saw a journey along an underground river of silvery water, then to the gates of a palatial city basking in the dark and protected by soldiers.”
Qara’s eyes softened, and she gave an almost-imperceptible nod.
Renee snorted. “It seems you can be fooled just as easily as everyone who’s read the Sacred History. It’s all a big game of misdirection. Sometimes,” she said, confidently, “the easiest path is the best. Occam’s Razor. And sometimes, the best choice is not to choose. We go in.”
The soldiers smiled, their steps lighter. They believed they were close, and the prospect of not having to pass over or around their mutilated comrades in either direction was a popular one. Chang ordered four men ahead through the door and down the stairs, into a slanting passage that was so dark no one could see the bottom.
“I suggest you to wait here,” Chang said to Renee. “Maybe more traps.”
“Doubtful,” she said, “given that we needed psychics to get this far and find this door, but just to be safe, we stay here and see what they find.”
“Agreed.”
Renee turned and pointed her gun at Qara’s face. “And if we lose these men too…”
Qara shrugged. “You’re acting rashly. If those men die, it will be your fault. I warned you.”
Renee took a breath, trying to calm herself. “Do you, in fact, know anything about what’s down here, or should I just put an end to your suffering?”
“Please,” Caleb said, “can we just focus? Qara can help. And I have seen that she will. But right now, you should have your men come back. We can try to remote view what’s down there again, try to visualize-”
“A coffin!” someone shouted, the voice amplified by Renee’s transceiver.
“Describe it,” she said back into the device.
In broken English, almost too choppy to comprehend, she heard, “We at bottom. In room, eight wall. Box in middle. Gold. Three meter long.”
“Carefully,” said Renee, “approach the casket.” She took a very deep breath, glancing from Caleb to Qara, seeing their expressions of resigned fear. “Touch it.”
“ Hao.”
Seconds passed without sound or commotion.
“Report?”
Crackling. Shuffling.
“Fine. Okay. We move top. Look inside. We see…”
“What? What do you see?”
Nothing.
“What’s going on?” Renee barked. Chang took a few steps down and Caleb moved close behind him, peering down. Maybe only forty steps and the stairwell widened, revealing the four beams of light playing around a room bare of any artwork, furniture or treasure; nothing save for a gilded coffin.
And the four men on their knees around it, holding their throats. Coughing, wheezing.
Chang started down, but Caleb caught his arm, even as he stepped back. “Gas. Poison.” Chang aimed his light past the contorting men, and for an instant Caleb caught a glimpse of a man’s face: a foaming mouth, blood trickling from his nose, his eyes crimson. The light stabbed through the triangular opening into the coffin, to reveal — nothing but a few strips of rags.
“They treated the cloth with something that would ferment, turn and release a gas that would be trapped in that air-tight coffin,” Caleb said, backing up and hanging his head, “until opened.”
Qara smiled. “By intruders who wouldn’t heed the warnings.”
Renee swung her fist, slamming it into Qara’s cheek and knocking her down. Then she pointed to Chang, whose horrified face had turned to bitter resolve. “Shut that door.”
Caleb couldn’t help but let out a snicker. “You’re running out of men, Agent Wagner. At this rate, pretty soon we’ll outnumber you.”
“Oh, I’ll make sure the odds stay in my favor. As I see it, Orlando and Qara here are nearly useless. They’ll go first. Now talk. Tell us which way.”
“I don’t think it matters.' He scratched his chin, staring again at the inscription. “ The best choice is not to choose. Maybe it means that our choice doesn’t matter.”
“So, what then?” Phoebe asked.
Caleb looked at each of them, including the ten remaining soldiers. “Who’s got a coin to flip?”
“Tails,” Orlando said, flipping and catching a gold dollar. “Looks like we’re headed left, for the old spike pit.”
“Damn,” Phoebe said. “I would’ve preferred the pancake room.”
Renee stared at the coin in Orlando’s open palm, two flashlight beams dancing across the eagle’s wings. “So, that’s it? All your vaulted abilities and we’re reduced to a coin toss?”
“That’s about right,” Caleb said. “Like I told you, our process takes months. Weeks at least. Even then, if we do see something, it’s hard to separate truth from imagination. In this case, the flip of a coin is as good as anything else.”
“I think,” Phoebe added, “that whichever way we choose, it won’t be easy.”
Qara cleared her throat as the soldiers prepared to move on Chang’s orders. Her eyes were haggard, and blood from the fresh cut on her cheek trickled down her bruised face. “Death walks with us.”
5
Nina led Colonel Hiltmeyer and Private Harris down the stairs first. Alexander followed after taking what he feared might be his last gulp of fresh air. Montross descended last, still holding aloft the Emerald Tablet in his left hand, his gun in his right. At the bottom, they followed the glow, approaching the threshold with caution.
“Left their floodlights behind,” Nina noted when they had passed the first door and saw the large halogen bulbs resting amidst the pile of skeletal remains.
“Good thing too,” Montross said, pointing at the mosaic floor. “Now we can follow Hansel and Gretel’s grisly trail.”
Alexander shuffled his feet, hands in his pocket, the chill reaching deeper as they proceeded. The air was dank and oppressive, stifling. The corridors on either side loomed dark and full of menace, and the stairs behind them only reminded him of the field of corpses above.
