he couldn't decipher them either.
After attentive deliberation, the samurai creaked to his feet with his own hand full of earth. His activity spurred me to join his side, and silently, I watched Kat select one stone from his hand, then skip it into the hallway. His tiny rock trickled over the seal and through the wall of sitting vapour, and there we heard it skip no more.
My companion frowned again, and then threw another stone with similar results — the sound immediately snuffed upon entering the paranormal smoke.
'What does it mean?' I asked, intrigued.
'A trap,' he said. 'We go back. There is nothing we can do.'
I laughed. This simple surrender made no sense in my mind. None at all. We could never set back down the mountain, not after last night's efforts, and definitely not with a wizard on our tail. No — This was the way, I was certain of it.
'Listen Kat, if Sir Isaac Newton, of all people, wanted me here, then this is no trap! Ask yourself — why have a trap all the way up here? That climb is all the security you need!'
'There are assassins,' he replied, tired. 'And no hill would keep an assassin from reaching his target.'
'Okay. It is a trap. To catch assassins? We're not assassins though, are we? Trust me for once. There's nothing to fear.'
With no ready reply from Kat, and my mind made up, I strode to the murky entrance.
'I've got a good feeling,' I said, shaking the fear from the ends of my fingertips. 'Nothing will happen. Nothing…will happen.'
My guide still unconvinced, I raised a foot, but before any trace of sole touched the marble, Kat harshly jerked me backward.
'What?' I complained.
The cantankerous samurai was not watching me, but the morning sky over our shoulder. Perhaps he was the view sort after all.
He raised his hand and my eye followed it to a chirping bird, resembling a robin and no larger. I sighed with relief, pleased to see something small for a change. The pair of us then watched as this innocent, singing thing came at us, over our heads and into the mysterious hallway. It swooped past the seal, but before disappearing into standing vapours, the two walls of marble smashed together like stone symbols, crushing the bird into powdery dust and blasting us off our feet.
Like a pair of exhaling lungs, the walls retracted to their original positions as rapidly as they had collided, and we lay dumbstruck on our backs.
'How is your good feeling now?' Kat asked me, flipping impressively to his feet.
I stood the old-fashioned way, beating the dirt from my clothes. Strangely, instinct told me to disregard the incident — This was the way!
'There's an angel urging me in,' I said, sure of myself. 'And in is where I'm going!'
Again, I lined both feet and ten toes before the marble, and an intrigued Kat watched me take the first steps inside. The crunch of my foot seemed to vibrate the whole corridor, and the confidence suddenly corroded inside me. I held my stance for over a minute in one position; trying not to breathe, not to let these walls smell my fear or feel my weight. Moving inch by meticulous inch, I heard every beat of my racing heart. The air frolicked with particles, irritating the eyes and sitting like an itch at the end of my nose; but still I moved forward, pausing now as I reached the circular seal of gold.
'Why do you stop?' Kat whispered, his vigilant question echoing into the corridor. 'Tell me why Fox?'
I was too absorbed in the seal to answer. It was a work of art, a masterpiece like those by the old masters. I almost couldn't bear to tread my dirty boots over it.
'Go on…' pressed Kat, engrossed. 'Almost.'
I did go on. I stepped on the seal and there was an instant reaction to my intimately placed foot. A gust came from the layer of fumes ahead, blowing back my hair and removing all the sitting dust on my nose. I froze like a plank, feeling wet beads glisten down my chin and any other place sweat could drip. Thoroughly shaken, I exhaled a moment later; and with Kat's badgering in the background, I painstakingly progressed over the seal.
My head ballooned with confidence when I passed, and did not leave me when I ventured through the bubbling folds.
'Fox?' hissed Kat, seeing nothing of me. 'Are you there?'
Suddenly, a torch burst into life, illuminating orange light all over the corridor. I stood at the far end of the hallway, facing Kat with the lamp burning on a wall behind.
'I didn't light it!' I said. 'It wasn't me!'
Turning to face that torch, this mountain puzzle now revealed one of her secrets. At the end of my toes was an abyss; like a starless space. It was impossible to guess how deep, but there was a possible route down.
'I see steps Kat! Hundreds and hundreds of steps!'
Old but sturdy looking, these steps twirled downward into the mouth of that dark grave.
'Come on Kat! It's safe!'
The suspicious samurai grumbled, but moved in all the same. Like mine, his movement over the seal had no effect on the walls. I reached my hand out for him when, for no apparent reason, Kat stopped dead on the balls of his feet. 'What's wrong?' I asked, confused.
Statuesque, Kat was listening. He could hear it and I could too — a familiar sound building, incoming — the chirp, chirp, chirping of another curious mountain bird. Eyes bulging, I pointed out the incoming bird behind Kat, lowering and buzzing wings into the hallway. My lips parted, but before my tongue could utter a warning, the marble walls trapped shut.
SMASH!
The energy of smashing rock blew out the lamp light and flung me backward down the spiralling steps. I plummeted, down and around in the dark forever, feeling my body become a peace of limp, battered meat until…
CRACK!
All was still. I had reached the bottom of this trench, and my world slowly stopped revolving.
Crumpled and half conscious; an excruciating ache burned all over and my vision was filled with a formless yellow light. When surrendering myself to unconsciousness, I experienced a sharp pain at my throat to keep me alert — a cold and prodding pressure. I had stabbed myself with my own dagger, I presumed, or broken my damn neck.
Placing a nervous hand to my throat, I found no dagger blade or protruding bone; there was however, the blunt tip of a spear. My eyes focused enough to see a towering man aiming the weapon at me. He had the craggy face of old age and a fuzzy brown beard with pieces of food caught inside it.
'Hells bells and buckets of blood!' he bellowed, like a mad man. 'Who dares enter my home? Answer before I stick you good!'
Food fell from his beard and onto my face, and my prolonged silence provoked the man into poking me further with the spear. 'Answer boy! Answer before you lose your heart and anything else that pleases me!'
'Newton…' I murmured. 'He sent…'
'Blast!' stormed the stranger, slapping a clenched fist into his palm 'That senile, bed pissing scientist! Who the hell does he think he is?'
His spear was removed from my neck leaving a sore indent. I tried to sit up but my mulched body flopped back to the stone.
'Dare you bleed on my floor?' the man cried, theatrically. 'How absolutely, bloody dare you lose your fluids on my flooring!'
This person then bent for a better look at me, and I him. He was shabby and unkempt, a dirty bear of a man.
'Look at you,' he tittered, 'all broken up. Well? What's your bloody name then? Tell me! I'll try and look interested.'
'Fo…Fox.'
'Fox?' he said, face screwing up. 'Vermin! I hate it!'
Groggily, I mumbled something back and the stout man sighed. 'My name is Bludgeon… and I don't give a monkeys if you hate my name. Got it? Do — ' He paused, catching a whiff of something he did not like.
