Angela’s middle-aged driver stood next to her. He was an imposing figure with road shoulders and a strong chest. Perhaps she would have some fun with him once they’d retrieved the next clue. “Who is in the other truck?” he interrupted her train of carnal thoughts. “There was just one earlier.”
“I’m not sure,” she said. “Looks like the other truck from last night. If so, that means there are more than just two of them. We still have numbers on our side. Just stay alert.” The team locked and loaded their weapons and started to head down the trail.
Tommy stopped at the bottom of the path and looked up at the waterfall. At the base of the falls, a narrow path ran along the face of the rock. It appeared to lead behind the mist and falling water. Carlson noticed it too and motioned with his gun towards the ledge. Tommy obeyed and stepped up onto the rock.
Tommy had to concentrate hard and pressed his back against the wall of rock just to keep his balance. The little ledge was probably less than a foot wide and even though the drop to the pool below was only about ten feet or so, the rocks beneath were fully capable of breaking bones or fracturing a skull.
Both men inched their way along, shuffling carefully until they were underneath an overhang of the waterfall. It was wet and slippery from the constant lathering of the billowing mist. Once behind the curtain of the falls, the ledge opened up as the rock face receded into the earth. The path widened to where they could walk normally across it for a short distance until it came to a dead end with a flat wall. They were standing on a large, circular piece of earth that jutted out from the stone. Tommy stared into a door-sized opening in the wall. It must have been a cave but it looked manmade. The precision of the angles and edges was nearly perfect. Above the top edge of the doorway, a strange symbol had been engraved into the stone. It was almost identical to the image he’d seen on the stone they discovered in Georgia: a spider.
Chapter 64
“You recognize that symbol?” Carlson asked as he stared up at the engraving.
Tommy nodded. “Yeah. I’ve seen it once before.”
“So this is the right place?”
“Seems to be.”
“Then get moving,” Carlson poked him in the back with the tip of his gun, prodding him to move forward. He handed Schultz a small flashlight as the two men moved into the darkness of the cave. He’d grabbed a few out of the truck before they left.
They had entered a small, circular room with three new, stone doorways. Each one had a different symbol over it, etched into the rock. The smooth walls were completely barren except for what was above the doors. Beyond the thresholds of each doorway, the interior was completely pitch black.
“Which one do we take?” Hunter asked, confused.
Tommy didn’t answer. Instead, he stepped closer to the door on the left, above it was a symbol that looked like a circle with a line through it.
“What is that?” Carlson pressed. “What does it mean?”
“It looks like Theta,” he answered. “The Greek symbol for death.”
“Death?” Carlson wondered as he stared at the symbol. “So I guess not that way then, huh?”
For the first time since his capture, Tommy noticed a bit of uncertainty in the man who had taken him captive. He’d been stoic up until that point. It was something Schultz had seen before. In awe of the ancient and mysterious, men’s minds filled themselves with wild evils that lurked in the dark.
“No,” Tommy answered flatly. “We won’t want to go that way.” Then, he stepped to the center door and examined the symbol above it. It had a circle with a diamond in the lower part. Beneath the diamond was a small cross. To the left and right of the circle were for lines that looked like legs with claws at each end.
“What’s that one?” Carlson asked impatiently.
“It’s Egyptian. It’s called Aten.”
“What does it mean?”
Tommy sighed, “It can have two meanings.” He pointed to the circle. “The disk represents the sun, giver of life,” he pointed at the cross-like object. “This is an ankh, the symbol of life. The eight legs originally represented a time frame. There were four years of famine and four years of plenty. The symbol was basically brought about by a Pharaoh named, Akhenaten. He changed the theology of the country and brought them under this banner of one, all powerful god.”
“I don’t need a history lesson. Do we go this way or not?” Hunter was becoming anxious.
“I don’t know,” Tommy said. “The symbol also represents the bringer of death. So it could be meant as a warning.” He stepped quickly over to the last door and scanned the image above. It was a side view of an oddly shaped head with an elongated mouth and large eye. Next to it was a disk that had two curved lines within it, forming a kind of broken “s.” Above both symbols was something that looked like a snake. “This one is also confusing,” Tommy started before Hunter could annoy him further. “The head is an ancient symbol of death in Aztec legends. The disk, however, is the symbol of life.” He stopped for a moment and considered the image. “The serpent was one of their gods. But I don’t think that’s what it is here.”
“What do you mean?” Carlson looked around, nervously. “I say we take the door in the middle.”
Tommy shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. You see, this is a cross referenced set of symbols here. This one isn’t the snake from Aztec lore. This one is different. I think it’s referring to something else.”
“Like what?”
“It’s referring to a choice that was given and a choice that had to be made: life or death. The serpent represented the choice.”
Tommy stared thoughtfully at the symbol above the third door. It had to be the right one. The story was starting to make sense. He remembered the first chamber of gold they found in the United States and the clues that led to it. They all came together under several different ancient cultures. He began to think about the cultures that were missing: Asian, Nordic, European. Why hadn’t there been anything from those places mingled in? Everything seemed to center around places that were predominant in the Bible.
As a child, Tommy had studied the Bible, as he did many other ancient scriptures, to learn about different beliefs and chronologies of old. But he’d not taken them to be entirely literal. His parents were not deeply religious. So he had not become entrenched into any religion.
As he stood before the darkened doorway, he began to make a connection. The Biblical references in Georgia and Tennessee, the clues left behind by Padre Crespi, and all of the symbols they’d seen so far were all places that were part of the ancient Biblical landscape. He wondered why. He felt the barrel of the gun pressing into the middle of his back again, cutting off his train of thought.
“Is this the door or not?”
The stranger was starting to get on his nerves but as long as he had the gun Tommy had to play ball. “I think so,” he answered, somewhat certain.
“Fine. You go first,” Carlson ordered.
Schultz did as he was told and started into the door. As he did, his foot tripped and he fell forward onto the stone floor.
Carlson stepped back, cautiously watching his prisoner’s sudden, random fall.
“Sorry,” Tommy said as he pushed himself back up off the ground. “I can be a little clumsy sometimes.”