“The One Thing?”
“The Philosopher’s Stone. The center of everything. Our minds and personalities come together as one unifying, powerful thought.”
“And the triangles on either side? And the star below?”
“Water on the left, Fire on the right. With the star below, signifying the union of Fire and Water, the permanent coming together of the Above and Below.”
Lydia nodded. Caleb couldn’t tell for sure, but in the shadows he imagined her giving an oddly satisfied smile.
“Sure you want to do this?” he asked. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel like we’ve passed the test, like we’re in any way ready. We don’t know what else to expect. If the water trap requires us to be prepared in some way, maybe all the others do too. I didn’t see far enough in my vision.”
Lydia stared at her shoes.
Caleb fidgeted. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what Sostratus did next.”
“Hopefully, your inspiration will come again and help us when we need it.”
“I don’t think so.” Caleb was again overcome with a terrible apprehension. And then, just as suddenly, he had the feeling someone was watching them. Someone not in this room, not even in sight. Someone… “Phoebe,” he whispered, and a deep chill seemed to rush in from unseen vents.
Is this what she saw — the time it would all turn for me?
A grinding sound echoed off the four walls. It seemed he had lost a minute of time, a minute in which the world had moved on without him. Lydia was kneeling at the base of the door, sniffling. She grunted with effort as she turned one of the signs — Saturn, the symbol for Fire.
“Wait!”
But she had stood up and reached for another symbol, the one Nina had turned first. Jupiter/ Water. Again the grating, scraping sound.
“It’s too late,” she said in a choked cry as she twisted the next sign: Mars/Air. “We’re about to see if you’re worthy.” She shot Caleb a look, and in the trembling flashlight beam he saw tears streaming from her eyes. “I’m sorry, Caleb.”
He reached for her and tried to yank her arm away. “Come on. We can still—”
“I didn’t finish the sequence!” she shouted as she pushed him off, thrusting him away with surprising strength.
Off balance, Caleb tripped and fell back. Dropped the light. And in the spinning beam he imagined the walls shifting, closing in. Thoth and Seshat moved, turning as before and contemplating the two intruders. And there was Lydia, reaching for another symbol. She finished with the Venus/Earth sign, and then reached for Mercury.
Caleb scrambled forward and dove for her. “Stop! We’ll come back when we know more!”
She twisted out of his way and kept him at bay with her kicking legs. “It’s too late!”
“What are you talking about?”
She grasped the Moon and, when her eyes settled on his, they looked cold and hard. “We’ve been waiting for you Caleb, but you let us down.”
He took a step back. He couldn’t breathe.
She spun the Moon, then reached for the crown above the snakes — the Sun. “We can’t wait for you to snap out of your psychic exile. I’d hoped to free you, but I’ve failed.”
“Who are you talking about?”
She gave Caleb a look of pity. Turning her back on him, she rotated the Sun. “As always Caleb, you haven’t asked the right questions.”
She lowered her head. “Remember me. Remember that I loved you.”
“Lydia…?” He took a step toward her.
“Back up, and get ready.” Her head inclined sideways. “You told me once how your mother’s powers were triggered. Your sister’s too.”
“Lydia!”
“Welcome, Caleb, to your personal trauma.”
“What are you—?”
A rumbling passed through the blocks and sand fell in thin veils. The wall rattled. Three fist-sized holes opened on each side of the door, and six plumes of gas hissed out. Pungent methane, strong and powerful, streamed from the openings. Caleb reached for Lydia, but she ripped her arm free, switched off her light, and darted to the side.
“Lydia!” In the sudden gloom, Caleb reached for his flashlight and speared the beam madly back and forth, catching a glimpse of her legs, rolling into the shadows, but then he heard a tortured cry of sharp rocks scraping together.
A spark in the darkness.
He cursed and leapt back two steps and curled into a ball, hugging his knees on top of the symbol for Lead.
Calcination.
A rush of heat, a burst of searing hot light. “Lydia!”
And the room became an inferno.
It was as if he knelt in a protective container. The entire chamber swirled in a fuming cyclone of volcanic fire, gases igniting and flames roaring all around. But Caleb was safe, barely uncomfortable from the heat. And then he felt it: all around the block he was crouched on, a rush of fresh air propelled upward, a maelstrom of wind creating a barrier. The stone block had lowered and compressed, and the gaps surrounding it expelled a rush of fierce, steam-laden air.
And as quickly as it had begun, it was over. The whoosh of flames subsided and Caleb stood, unscathed. He had only a moment to take stock of the smoking room and realize that even if Lydia had somehow survived the blast, neither of them would make it past the next trap.
The cords were gone, incinerated.
Coughing from the noxious fumes and the choking heat, he spun the light around, desperately looking for some sign that Lydia might have survived, terrified he’d see a smoking corpse.
Then he heard the door grating again, and now it started to open as if pushed from the other side by a pair of monstrous Titans. He took one last look around the room, saw the melted flashlight against the edge of the pit, smoke and embers rising from its depths.
Then he turned and fled, racing to the ascending stairs and bounding between Thoth and his mistress, just as the great door burst open and the ravenous flood roared in.
Three steps at a time he climbed, never looking back. The water chased after him like a rabid jackal, snapping at his legs. He splashed up the next flight of stairs, dragging his feet through the rising water, and then lunged and collapsed on the cool, dry steps above.
He screamed and slammed his fists against the unyielding granite.
He aimed the flashlight back down. The waters were receding. He followed them back down, step by step. He walked between Thoth and Seshat, trading a wounded glare for their scolding expressions. His feet splashed on the limestone blocks as he played the light around the room.
He waited, poised to flee back up the stairs at the slightest hint of a new trap. He watched and counted the seconds, counted the beats of his devastated heart, urging it to calm.
Nothing else happened. The door remained open, a yawning cavern of blackness, defying even his powerful flashlight beam. All his other supplies had either been reduced to ashes or swept away in the flood. He was left alone with nothing but his mind, as clear as it had become.
He waited. And then he thought, I’m not on the next block, not putting weight on the Iron stone.
Suddenly, the door closed with a quick, efficient snapping back into place. On the seal, the wheels all spun back to their original positions as if nothing had happened.
Caleb switched off his light. Alone, he hung his head and embraced the silent darkness.
9
Acceptance did not set in for another week.
A week in which Caleb had divided his time above and below the harbor. He’d read the papers every day, fearing the worst. After the first day he had rented a boat and cruised around the peninsula, looking for anything that had washed up. As always, Fort Qaitbey had brooded staunchly, baking in the sun as a few tourists lingered about beyond the outer walls. He’d resisted venturing again below, but the chamber beckoned, whispering for him to come back, to dwell there forever. To ease the loneliness of those ancient halls.