The climb was a bastard. The stairs were so steep that I had to use my hands as well, crawling up like a jungle bug. Tactically they were brilliant: no one could mount them with a weapon in hand, and by the time you got to the top, you were too winded to be much of a threat.
About halfway up, I had to stop and wait for a snake to finish crawling across one step. It was as big around as my arm, and in no hurry. I glanced down at the others, which was a mistake. The stairs were so close to vertical that my head began to spin, and it wasn’t hard to imagine toppling down them to my death. At last the snake’s tail appeared, and in moments it was gone into the weeds.
When I finally reached the top, I knelt on the last step and rested my upper body on the plateau’s ground, waiting to catch my breath before taking a detailed look around. My shoulder throbbed something fierce, but I didn’t have the heart to see if that was sweat I felt or blood. I momentarily closed my eyes, and when I opened them, an enormous hair-covered spider bigger than my hand sat looking at me, its dozens of eyes gleaming in the sun.
I stared. It stared. I said, “You can try it, pal, but you ain’t got enough ass in your web to handle me today.”
The spider seemed to agree. It turned and scuttled away into the undergrowth.
The plateau was really a flattened foothill of the island’s nearest mountain. The stream ran across it and disappeared into the jungle on the other side. A stone path led from the top of the stairs to a small wooden house, bigger than any of the huts below but still nothing grand, certainly not the castle of a pirate king. One huge tree loomed over it, casting it in shade. The windows were dark and curtainless. In fact, there was no sign of any movement or life at all. Somewhere a jungle bird squawked in amusement.
I pushed myself to my feet and walked toward it. Despite being hot from climbing, I shivered. There was something hostile in the air, as if invisible forces sought to stop me. Halfway to the house, I called out, “Hello? Anyone in there? I’m looking for Edward Tew. Angelina Dirnay sent me.”
The house remained dark and still. A steaming tropical wind stirred the boughs of the tree, and it reminded me of some enormous beast awakened by a foolish traveler.
On the off chance I was, in fact, being watched, I took off my sword and put it on the ground. Seldom have I felt so naked without it. I raised my hands. “Look, I’m unarmed. I just want to talk. Okay?”
There was still nothing. Whoever, or whatever, might be in the house wasn’t coming out. Several bright red birds launched from the big tree and sailed out over the jungle below the plateau. From here I could see the Red Cow in the harbor, and the persistent fog bank beyond.
I also spotted the remains of a large bonfire in the open space away from the trees. In it were rectangular wooden frames. Now I knew the fate of the pictures taken from the huts below. But what did they depict that caused someone to hate them so much?
I picked up my sword and went back to the top of the stairs. Far below, the others looked up expectantly, and I waved for them to join me. Whatever I was walking into, I’d feel much more secure with them at my back.
Like me, everyone needed a moment to recover after the climb. The bloodstain on Jane’s leg was bigger now, but she neither mentioned it nor limped. Suhonen stood motionless, staring intently at the house. Clift said, “No sign of anyone?”
I shook my head. “No. I shouted when I first got here, but there was no response. I don’t think anyone’s in there.”
“No one’s crawling up the steps after us, either,” Jane said as she checked. “There must be another way off this high ground. Pirates like to drink, and those steps would kill a drunk.”
“Maybe that was the point,” Clift mused. “Well, shall we?”
We strode down the stone path to the house. The hot wind blew back our hair, and seemed to moan through the distant rocks above the tree line. Unruly vines and weeds had claimed the edges of the clearing, and it looked as though the primeval forest would soon regain possession of it, just like the path that brought us here.
I knocked on the door. The wood was laden with moisture, and mold clung to its edges. It made a wet smacking sound instead of the sharp rap I expected.
I pushed the door; it was unlatched, and swung open with a high-pitched creak. The tree’s shade made the interior dark despite the numerous windows. Jane, sword in hand, flattened against the wall on one side of the door, Suhonen on the other. Clift stayed behind me, his sword still on his belt. Duncan stood beside him.
With my hands loose at my side, I stepped into the house, ducking low at the last moment in case someone waited to take off my head. Nothing happened. I stood up and waited for my eyes to adjust.
As they did, something extraordinary happened. It was like I’d entered some sort of spellbound cottage. From the sunblasted jungle outside, I now trod the darkness of a rain forest hidden in perpetual dusk. I sensed great ancient forests around me, with its naked inhabitants peering out around the trunks of the great trees. I blinked a few times, and the images resolved into things painted on the walls and ceilings.
I forgot to breathe. The detail, design, and execution of these images was extraordinary. The trees began with spidery root patterns that extended from the baseboards onto the floor, and their trunks climbed the walls until limbs branched out across the ceiling. The colors were vivid, brighter than life and yet somehow pulsing with it. Birds of red, orange, and yellow sat among the leaves, and here and there were parts of snakes, lizards, and insects. Behind the trees, simple blurred lines suggested the rest of the forest, with occasional faint beams of sunlight implying depth.
As a baron’s son in Arentia, I’d been taught the basics of art appreciation, and I knew without a doubt I was in the presence of genius. I turned slowly, taking it all in. Who the hell did all this?
There were people there, too. A bare arm here, a naked breast there, dark hair obscuring faces… It was the kind of tribe that you might find on an island like this. Had there been one before the pirates arrived? If so, where were they now?
“Eddie?” Jane called from outside. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I answered numbly. “It’s, uhm… all clear.”
They joined me in the house, Suhonen having to duck to get through the door, and were equally startled by the art. “Good grief,” Jane said at last. “Somebody had a lot of free time.”
Clift touched one of the paintings. It had begun to flake off the wood. “It won’t last much longer.”
I felt a sharp pang of anguish that this wonder might not be long for the world, but I brought myself back to the moment and looked past the art at the house containing it. This was the big main room, with a stove in one corner, a desk in another, and nothing else. A door led into a second room, where only a rumpled bed remained. On the bedroom floor, though, several recent bare footprints had marked the dust. Our watcher in the woods?
“Eddie?” Jane called. “You better come see this.”
I joined her. They all stood in front of one section of the wall, where the artist had painted a nude woman leaning seductively back against a tree. In one hand she held some sort of fruit. She was depicted larger and more prominently than any of the others, who were shown hiding and peeking out.
When I didn’t react fast enough, Jane said, “Look above her neck.”
I did, and got my biggest surprise yet. It was, without a doubt, Angelina.
It wasn’t just the detail, which he got right-well, at least on the parts of her body I could personally verify. He’d captured something ineffable about her, so that anyone who knew her couldn’t fail to recognize her. Her expression was one I’d seen many times, a mixture of annoyance and amusement that, coupled with her nudity, made her almost unbearably sexy. My mind involuntarily conjured up the memory of our one kiss all those years ago, and I felt an uncomfortable arousal building in me.