“A barrel of laughs, both of you,” Ben said, starting the stove to warm water for coffee.
“Good evening, Benjamin,” Giovanni said. “Did you rest well?”
“Sure. Coffee?”
“No thank you.”
“Tea for me,” Tenzin said.
“I didn’t bring tea.”
She pulled her gaze away from the reflecting pool. “How did you not bring tea?”
“Because I felt like bringing coffee.”
She stared at him. “You’re very selfish.”
“I know.” He poured ground coffee in the french press. “I try to follow your example. Next time, you pack the kitchen stuff and we won’t have this problem.”
Giovanni rose. “Before we get into a fight, children, why don’t we go over the plan for the evening?”
“I’ll be sitting bored in the cave without tea while you have fun exploring the tunnel,” Tenzin said. “What is there to clarify?”
Giovanni stared at her. Then he turned to Ben. “Next time just bring tea so she’s not so cranky.”
“If you think tea is going to solve her attitude problem, you’re wildly optimistic.”
They suited up after Ben had eaten and revived with caffeine. He’d brought his clean coveralls from San Juan and found another pair for Giovanni at the local Walmart with a pair of thick rubber boots. With helmets and headlamps, they were ready to explore the third cave. Ben carried the tool belt with the hammer, gear, pitons, and ropes.
“We’ll anchor pitons as needed to keep track of what passages we’ve explored. The ropes are mainly for navigation, not anchoring. The other two caves had relatively even surfaces, so we didn’t have to use ropes for climbing. If this one is different, we’ll have to leave and get more gear.”
Giovanni stared at Ben as he rattled off basic safety precautions. “Where did you learn all this?”
“YouTube!” Tenzin shouted from the mouth of the tunnel. “There are hours and hours of video. You can learn anything on YouTube.”
Ben shrugged. “She’s mostly right, though I have taken some climbing classes. There are principles that cross over. These caves are pretty even and I’m exploring with vampires, so it’s not as risky as most human caving.”
“Not as risky except for the cave-in during the last trip?”
“That was my fault. That cave was too muddy to explore. We shouldn’t have risked it. I was being stupid.”
“Don’t get gold fever, Ben. That’s all I ask.”
He nodded. “You ready?”
“You have enough light?”
Ben patted the flashlight at his waist, his helmet lamp, and the glow sticks in his pocket. “I’m good.”
“Let’s go.”
The tunnel floor was even, with about as much variation as the first tunnel. With Enríquez’s map in hand, they marked off the turns, taking their time to set pitons as needed and mark passages with tape. Ben didn’t like using it, but it was necessary. He’d remove it before they left, along with as many of the pitons as he could find.
“First turn. Left is clear.”
“Marking.”
They worked in steady silence broken by directions as Ben called for Giovanni to mark on the notebook he’d started for the other two tunnels.
“Third turn, straight ahead. Clear.”
“Marking.”
“Fifth turn.”
“Marking.”
Steadily making his way deeper, his uncle at his back, Ben felt a sense of calm he hadn’t felt before.
This was it. This was the tunnel. They were going to find it this time.
“Eighth turn.” Ben felt his heartbeat pick up when they reached the last turn on the map. This was it. They’d never gotten this far in any of the other tunnels. “Right.” He shined the light ahead of him, searching the darkness of the passage for the final left turn.
Nothing.
Dead end.
“No.”
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“What do you mean?”
Ben turned and angled his headlamp down. “I mean it’s a dead end. We messed up somewhere.”
“Are you sure?”
“It’s limestone,” Ben said. “No sign of a cave-in. We’ve just got the wrong tunnel. Or we made a wrong turn somewhere.” He sighed. “It’s fine. We go back. We work it again.”
Giovanni was looking at the map in his hand. Not the neatly marked notebook, the map. It wasn’t the real map, of course. It was a copy.
“Come on.” He started to back out of the tunnel. “I have an idea.”
“The map was drawn by Enríquez and intended for him alone.” Giovanni was sitting near the stove while Ben heated water for coffee. “But he had to know it could be stolen if his papers were confiscated.”
“So you’re saying he wouldn’t draw an accurate map?” Ben said. “That kind of defeats the purpose of a treasure map.”
“I’m not saying that. I’m saying on the original map—” Giovanni pulled out his heavily insulated tablet and handed it to Tenzin. “You know my password. Pull up the pictures. On the original map, there was a marking on the back that I couldn’t quite make sense of.”
Tenzin scrolled through countless shots of Giovanni’s newly adopted daughter and Beatrice, Giovanni looking over her shoulder.
“There.” Even pointing his finger at the screen caused it to flicker. “I hate this thing.”
“Fire vampires really can’t use electronics, can they?”
“It’s a recipe for disaster,” Giovanni muttered. “Not that shot, scroll right.”
Tenzin scrolled right.
“There,” Giovanni said. “Look at that marking.”
Tenzin held up the tablet. “What does that look like to you?”
Ben glanced over. “A chicken scratch. I saw it before. I assumed it was a crease in the document.”
Giovanni shook his head. “It’s not. It’s very obviously not when you see the original.”
Ben squinted in the low light. “Then I guess… the letter T?”
“Yes,” Giovanni said. “Doesn’t that make sense?”
“Doesn’t what make sense?” Ben lifted the boiling water from the stove, poured it over the coffee grounds, and inhaled deeply. Heaven.
“The T on the back of the map.”
“Ohhhh,” Tenzin said. “Brilliant. A simple trick only he would know. But then he left the map for Tomás. He had to give him a sign.”
“I think so.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Ben said. “The map—”
“The original map was written on vellum,” Giovanni said. “Very thin, very fine vellum.”
“Yeah, so you said—”
“Which means if you put a light up to it, it was nearly translucent.”
Ben looked up. “And the T was on the back of the map.”
“Yes.”
Oh, well that was just perfect. “We’ve been looking at it backward.”
“No, you’ve been looking at it from the front. The only problem was, Enríquez made it to be viewed backward. A very simple trick to fool anyone who might steal the map. Maybe not enough to fool them forever, but enough to discourage them. For them to think it was a fraud.”
“But when he left it for Tomás—”
“He had to leave a sign for Tomás to look at it from the right angle.” Giovanni closed his eyes. “Now, if we look at it backward—”
“All the turns are reversed. We should be going left, left, straight, right, not the other way round.”
“Exactly.”
Ben left his coffee where he’d poured it. “Come on.”
“Right back in?”
“Are you kidding?” he said. “This is the first encouraging thing I’ve heard in weeks. Let’s go.”
Ben and Giovanni zipped up their coveralls and put on their helmets, quickly tying a new anchor at the mouth of the tunnel.
“You have the notebook?” Ben aske
d.
“Yes. And the map. We’ll just be going the opposite way this trip.”
“Marking the first turn… left.”
“Left.”
They walked forward slowly; the ground was a little more uneven on this side of the cavern.
“Left.”
“Marking.”
The passage opened up into a larger room, and Ben could see the tunnel directly opposite the one they’d just exited. That must be the tunnel where they needed to go straight. Excitement humming in his veins, he stepped forward, nearly tripping over a rock that blocked his path.
“Benjamin.”
“Shit.” He shined his flashlight down and gasped at the gaping mouth of the skeleton crumbled against the rock. Which wasn’t a rock. It was the remains of a small wooden chest with the lid flung open. Ben carefully stepped away.
“It smells like death,” Giovanni said quietly. He shined his flashlight around the cavern, and Ben saw what Giovanni and Tenzin had both sensed.
Human remains lined the walls of the limestone room, tumbled carelessly in piles. Dozens of skulls were visible.
“Vampire?”
“There is nothing left but bones,” Giovanni said quietly, “so there’s no way of knowing for sure, but it’s certainly more likely than a demon.”
“It is a demon. The demon of Camuy.” Ben shined his flashlight on the chest. “Did you see this?”
“Yes.” Giovanni bent down, picking through the remains.
There were scraps of cloth and an old pair of muskets. A scattering of dull black coins spilled from under the bones.
“What are you looking for?”
“Time period,” he said. “I’m guessing these are several hundred years old, which would match with the era we’re looking at.”
“Which means this chest…” Ben couldn’t take his eyes off it.
“Yes. It could be Miquel Enríquez’s treasure.”
The simple wooden chest was covered in dirt and mold. The bones draped over it had tumbled to the side, revealing a brass plate too dirty to read. An old chest, a few coins, and weapons too corroded to use.
“If this is the whole treasure—”
Distant sounds of shouting caused both Ben and Giovanni to stand up straight.
“Tenzin?” Ben shouted.
Nothing.
He and his uncle exchanged a look before they quickly left the bones and the chest where they were lying and retraced their steps. Ben slid the notebook and map in his coveralls to keep them safe. When they entered the cavern, Ben saw Tenzin sitting with a cup of his coffee.
Vasco, Inés, and half a dozen other vampires were standing over her.
“You might need to make more coffee,” she said.
21
“Inés,” Ben said cautiously. “It’s nice to see you. Can I ask why you’re here?”
Inés didn’t speak. Her eyes moved between Ben and Giovanni, narrowed with suspicion.
Tenzin piped up again. “I believe she said something about arresting me.”
Ben’s eyebrows rose of their own accord. He looked at Vasco. “I really don’t suggest that. It won’t end well for you.”
“That’s what I told them,” Tenzin said.
“Tenzin, you should probably be quiet,” Giovanni said calmly. He stepped forward. “Are you here about me?”
Vasco spoke. “All of you will be taken to the cacique.”
“May I ask why?” Giovanni said. “I am Giovanni Vecchio. I have been on the island a matter of days, assisting my nephew and business partner. I had fully intended to introduce myself to the court of Los Tres, but I did not expect this unfriendly welcome.”
“You call us unfriendly?” Inés finally spoke. “A respected human scholar known to be an associate of yours was found dead two nights ago, just hours after you visited him, and yet you object to our greeting?”
The silence of the cavern was broken only by the sound of the flowing waterfall. Ben didn’t turn to look at his uncle, but he could feel the heat from Giovanni’s skin. Hear the barely controlled rage when he finally spoke.
“This has nothing to do with August,” Giovanni said. “Take me to your cacique.” He stepped forward. “I believe a meeting could be most… illuminating.” He looked at Ben and spoke in Chinese. “I smell someone familiar.”
Tenzin began to laugh, and the sound was enough to chill Ben’s skin.
Familiar? Like one of the vampires in Camino’s apartment? The male or the female? Ben was dying to ask, but he didn’t say a word.
Vasco jerked his head toward the vampires waiting near the entrance to the cavern. They surrounded Giovanni and Tenzin.
Six against those two? You really have no idea, do you?
Vasco and Inés walked over to Benjamin. “You will take us to the treasure,” Inés said.
“What treasure?”
“The treasure of Miguel Enríquez,” Vasco said. “The treasure that belongs to the people of this island.”
“We haven’t found any treasure,” Ben said.
“I don’t believe you.” Inés shoved him toward the tunnel. “Show us.”
“Ben,” Giovanni called across the cavern. “It’s okay.” His eyes met Ben’s in the dim light. “Show them the chest.”
What are you doing? Ben’s eyes screamed.
Giovanni’s gaze was calm. Trust me.
Ben put his helmet back on. “You’re going to want to watch your head.”
Vasco and Inés followed Ben back into the tunnel. Since the paracord had remained threaded through the pitons, it was easy to find their way back.
Inés and Vasco entered the bone-filled chamber, their noses twitching.
“What is this place?” Inés said.
“The lair of the demon of Camuy,” Ben said. “And the place where Enríquez hid his treasure.”
Vasco wrinkled his nose when he saw the piles of bones. “Savage,” he muttered under his breath.
“It’s here.” Ben swung his flashlight toward the wooden box.
It was a plain sea chest, the kind a sailor might take with him to carry his personal possessions, which meant it was far from fancy. No iron bars or fancy scrollwork around the lock. The metal was black with corrosion. The wood was dirty but intact. Only the lid had fallen apart.
Vasco used his boot to scatter the bones surrounding the chest. In the low light, it was nearly impossible to see what the broken chest revealed. Inés walked over and bent down to the ground. She picked up a small piece of metal and lifted it to the light from Ben’s headlamp. It looked like a coin at first, but Ben realized it was a blackened silver medal, like a saint medal a Christian would wear around his neck.
“Is this all?” she asked, glancing at Ben. “You’ve been searching for weeks.”
Ben hadn’t even looked inside the chest yet, but it gave him a perverse satisfaction that she was disappointed. “Do you realize how many tunnels and passageways there are down here?” he asked. “This place is a maze. We were lucky to find this.” He glanced at the dozens of skeletons. “And honestly, anything else more valuable was probably taken years ago by whoever killed all these people.”
Inés gave a short dismissive grunt and waved at Vasco. “Bring it,” she said. “It might be useful.”
“You.” Vasco pointed at Ben. “Carry it.”
Ben tried not to groan.
Vampires.
There were two pickup trucks waiting at the top of the trail to take them back to the mountain outside Lares. Ben, Tenzin, and Giovanni were loaded in the back of one while Vasco, Inés, and the sea chest were loaded in the other.
Ben and Giovanni were exchanging glances with each other while Tenzin was glaring at the pickup truck behind them containing the sea chest.
“You gave them the treasure,” she muttered in Chinese.
Ben answered in the same language. “Did I really have a choice not to?”
“Both of you, shut up.” Giovanni joined them. “Don’t bicker.”
> “If he hadn’t—”
“She never thinks about the fact that—”
“Shut up!” Giovanni snapped. “You’re both being shortsighted idiots at the moment. I’m thinking.”
Ben was thinking too. About how Inés and Vasco had found them. About why they’d stopped them. About why Giovanni was calling him shortsighted. They’d spent weeks searching for the treasure of Miguel Enríquez, only to find a single chest nowhere near the location their map—
“Oh!” Ben’s eyes went wide when he realized why Giovanni was calling him shortsighted. He glanced at his uncle, only to see his uncle giving him a “shut up” expression.
Tenzin was still glaring at him.
He settled in for the ride, taking mental notes about their captors and wishing he could have hidden the notes and map better.
The vampires guarding them had to know they were risking their lives, because all four in the back of the truck looked terrified.
Vasco, Inés, and their driver were all in the rear truck. Four vampires and a driver were with Giovanni, Tenzin, and Ben. They hadn’t tried to tie them up or pull any weapons on them, which was smart. Tenzin usually had a negative reaction to anyone pulling a weapon on her.
She looked sullen. Giovanni looked stoic.
Vasco and Inés knew about Camino. Did that mean they’d killed him? Were they trying to frame Giovanni?
Giovanni had smelled someone familiar. Was it Vasco or Inés? One of the other vampires?
Who was the demon of Camuy? Did it matter? And if there was treasure in the demon’s lair the whole time, did that mean the demon of Camuy had already taken anything worthwhile?
Ben typically didn’t get carsick, but sliding back and forth in the back of a truck while facing backward going up twisted dirt roads left him feeling more than a little queasy by the time they stopped.
He followed the parade of immortals from the back of the truck, through the house, and down the sloping avenue toward the mountain court of Macuya, the cacique of Puerto Rico. Tenzin walked in front of him, floating over the ground every now and then just to make their captors look a little panicky. Giovanni walked beside him, his head held high, looking down his nose at all the vampires surrounding them.
Ben had to admit his uncle had been trained to be superior, and when he wanted to, Giovanni pulled it off better than any aristocrat Ben had ever met.
Blood Apprentice: An Elemental Legacy Novel Page 21