Kaylin appeared frozen in place. How could she even consider this? She looked at Dane, and a question seemed to hang in the air. What did she want him to do? Talk her out of it? The hell with that! If she was crazy enough to stay here, let her.
And then it struck him. What was it that really bothered him? The fact that she might choose, in his estimation, the dangerous course of staying here and risking the wrath of the people of Kephises, or that she couldn’t seem to decide whether she wanted him or Thomas? In any case, there was no time to ponder it further.
“I think you’re both crazy if you stay here,” he said. “Mobs aren’t known to be judicious, and if they’re half as angry as Fawcett seems to believe, it’s not a risk you should take. Whatever you decide, though, you need to make up your mind now. They could be here any second, and we’re bugging out.”
Kaylin took Thomas’s face in her hands. “Come with us,” she whispered. “It’s not safe for you here.”
“I see.” Thomas’s tone was as flat as the expression on his face. He pulled her hands away and stepped back. “You made your choice.” His eyes flitted in Dane’s direction for the briefest of moments. “Now go.”
“Thomas, please.”
“No!” Thomas turned his back on Kaylin, crossed his arms, and stared at the wall. “Hurry, before they catch up with you all. I’ll tell them I think you went into the forest. That should buy you some time.”
Tears running in rivulets down her cheeks, Kaylin bolted the room, and Dane followed. He didn’t know what to say to Kaylin, and frankly, he wasn’t inclined to talk to her right now. Maybe, if they both got out of this mess in one piece, they would talk about it then.
The passageway led down into an antechamber, the walls of which were carved with scenes from Carthage’s history, mostly great military victories. Dane felt a pang of regret that he could not stop to examine them more closely. I find Fawcett’s lost city and I don’t get to stay but for a few hours, he thought.
The antechamber opened into a room about forty feet square, its walls angled inward, approximating the shape of the pyramid outside, meeting at a tiny shaft far overhead. Two flickering oil lamps flanked an ancient Grecian urn atop a stone altar, which was supported by a four foot-high block of stone, in the room’s center. Dane did a double-take, realizing this urn was very likely the legendary Pandora’s Box.
“About time,” Bones greeted them. “Thought you’d decided to stay here and play hero a little longer.”
Dane shook his head and inclined his head toward Kaylin. Bones took one look at her face, still wet from tears, and understanding filled his eyes. “Gotcha. Sorry, Kaylin.”
“This is the temple,” Fawcett explained unnecessarily. “The way out is back here.” He waved for them to come around to the back side of the altar.
“I’m surprised no one is in here,” Dane observed. “No priests?’
“The guards have all left to fight. The priestess who was to have been here tending the flame is, um, a close friend of mine. She chose to tend to the wounded for a little while. Long enough for you to make your escape.”
Dane rounded the altar and watched Fawcett place his hand over a symbol carved in the stone block on which the altar rested, and press down. A trap door sprang open, revealing a low, dark tunnel.
“In here,” Fawcett said, motioning toward the opening. Bones took the lead, and the others followed, until only Dane remained. Fawcett grabbed his arm. “Listen carefully. You will come out at an underground river. Follow it down to where it ends in a box canyon. At the far end of the canyon, you will find the black water.’
“What is the black water?”
“You followed my great-grandfather’s map, did you not?” Dane nodded, and Fawcett continued. “All I know is that you should have left the river and passed into the black water.”
“Okay. I know the place you’re talking about.” He meant the lagoon where they had left their boats. Perfect.
“Take this.” Fawcett shoved a small pouch of woven grass into his hand. “It is the last seed from the tree. Take it somewhere safe. Its power is great, as is its potential for harm, and for that reason, we cannot risk those men coming back for it.” He paused. “But something so wondrous should not pass from this world.”
“But, this rightfully belongs to Kephises!” Dane protested. “It’s their secret to guard, not ours.”
Fawcett laughed. “It is a secret that once belonged to Carthage. Before that, it was Athens’s secret, Sparta’s before that, and so on. The tree does not belong to any one people. Not forever, at any rate.”
“What happens when they find it gone?”
“I rubbed ash on an avocado seed and switched them out. It looks quite similar. I don’t doubt the priesthood will discover the switch when it comes time for planting. By that time, you will be long gone, and hopefully they will blame one of you. No offense.”
“None taken.” The bag had a long drawstring of vine, so Dane hung it around his neck and tucked the pouch inside his shirt. “Thank you.” He shook Fawcett’s hand and turned to make his escape.
“One last thing,” Fawcett said. “The legends say the box canyon is the domain of the mapinguari. Be careful.”
Dane was halfway into the passageway, but he stopped and looked back. “What is a mapinguari?”
“A monster, I suppose. That’s all I know.” Fawcett looked around. “I had better go. They can’t know that I helped you. It is not my life I care about, but my friend’s. Good luck!” He hastily pushed the trapdoor closed, leaving Dane in darkness.
It had been far too easy to elude his pursuers, Kennedy thought. They certainly lacked the tracking skills of the natives of this region. If this place truly was a remnant from the ancient world, isolation had caused them to go soft. He had outdistanced them, doubled back, and slipped past their line. It might have appeared that he’d fled in panic, but it had been a strategic retreat. He was out of allies and weapons, save his KA-BAR.
How had he let himself lose it like that? When he saw Brown lying dead, something inside him had snapped, just like in Kandahar. He couldn’t let it happen again. This mission was a hair’s breadth from failure, and it would take all his skills and a bigger dose of luck to get him through.
The minutes crept by, and gradually the people retired to their quarters, leaving only a few out on patrol. He needed to catch one of them alone so he could get some answers.
As if on cue, a man came strolling down the path toward Kennedy’s hiding place. Incredibly, he appeared to be unarmed and unconcerned about his own safety. When the man passed by, Kennedy raised up, grabbed him from behind, and dragged him into the undergrowth.
“You speak English?” Kennedy growled his hand pressing down on the man’s nose and mouth. The man nodded, though his eyes were on Kennedy’s KA-BAR, which hovered a few inches from his face. The man held Kennedy’s wrist in a firm grip, keeping the knife at bay, but Kennedy was stronger; even as the man held on, the knife moved incrementally closer.
“I want to know what Thomas Thornton was after.”
The man gave his head a little shake, as if he did not know what Kennedy was talking about, but there had been a momentary flash of understanding in his eyes that Kennedy did not miss. He knew something! Kennedy leaned a little harder, and the knife moved closer. The man was turning purple from lack of air, and the blade of the knife was dangerously close to his eye. Finally, the fight went out of his eyes and he nodded.
“Tell me everything, tell me quiet and fast, and you might live.” He removed his hand and the man sucked in a breath. In short order he had spun an incredible tale of a tree with the power to make a man a killer or a pacifist — at least that was how Kennedy understood it. Apparently, it was also what had spawned those zombie men they had encountered previously. The warrior he had questioned earlier had also claimed the tree was special. A sudden, disturbing thought turned his insides cold.