At least no more pain than need be.
The first cut is the deepest. Yeah, an old song. But there was a truth in the line. And didn’t condemned criminals used to tip the executioner way back? So they’d kill in a way that was merciful. No agony. No screaming.
“Geez. Okay, okay. Get it over quick.”
“Lake, remove your clothes.”
He did as he was told, moving by touch in the darkness.
“Now move forward to the cage bars… Closer, Lake. Closer… Move your feet until you’re hard up to the bars.”
Did as he was told. Kept his eyes tight shut. Clenched his fists.
Come on, get it over with.
Do it.
Use that blade.
Then came a surprise. A terrible surprise.
“Oh, God, no.”
His heart lurched. His stomach plunged.
A hand closed around his testicles.
“Oh, please, God, no.”
He waited for the hand to grip tight. Squeeze ferociously. Then for the tingling edge of a blade against his soft scrotum.
Gonna whip off your balls, Eddie boy.
Then let’s hear how you scream.
His eyes opened with shock staring into the darkness. They’d never opened as wide as this before. He felt they’d simply pop out with the pressure inside his skull. And just for a second he did see. There was a faint reddish light coming from somewhere. He thought he saw a cowled figure—almost like a monk. And goggles of some sort.
They were wearing goggles. Round ones. Welder’s goggles?
Then the dim red light died. Once more there was darkness.
Suddenly the grip on his balk changed. Here comes the knife.
Wait for it… wait for it. They’re positioning the blade nice and close to his groin.
Suddenly the hand was gone. Maybe his captor was gone too. That was it! Mind games again. Inflict psychological pain rather than physical. If that was the—
Then he felt a cold pressure against his foot. To be precise against his little toe.
That was strange. Why should—
He didn’t have any more thinking time than that. He heard a loud metallic tap—metal on metal. Then a crunch. A loud one.
After that there was no time for rational contemplation. That was out of the window, along with standing still.
A wave of agony flashed up his leg. It set his brain alight.
The next thing he knew he was rolling on the floor, screaming, holding his foot.
Only his foot no longer seemed the same.
The lights had been on for a whole hour. He lay on his side. The concrete floor must have been hard and uncomfortable, but he didn’t notice.
“I’m sorry for what they did to you. Listen, Ed, I’m sorry.” Virginia must have repeated the words many times, but when he didn’t respond she let him alone.
He lay there without moving for what seemed an age. He lay looking through the bars of the cage at something that lay on the floor.
It was a small object. Almost insignificant.
It lay in a pool of blood on the concrete. A little island in a sea of blood.
“I don’t believe they did that,” he said to himself at last. “They cut it off… they cut off my little toe.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
When Ed Lake woke, his little toe was gone. The blood was gone too. All that remained was a wet area of concrete.
So, like a goofy kind of Tooth Fairy, they’d come in the middle of the night.
Taken the toe. Left him nothing in return. Some Toe Fairy…
He laughed.
“Now that does surprise me,” Virginia said from the next cage.
“What does?”
“They cut your toe off and you find it funny.”
“Considering Marco, and what the alternative might have been, I’m damn lucky.”
“I guess you’re right. Go ahead and have yourself a belly laugh.”
“Maybe it’s not that funny.”
“Hurt?”
“Like hell.” He rubbed his head. “Maybe it’s the blood loss. I feel drunk.”
“Probably that and shock too. Drink plenty of water.”
“Good idea.” He reached for a water bottle that hung from one of the roof bars.
She looked at his foot. “Still bleeding?”
“Nope. I clamped a mountain of toilet tissue to it. Stopped eventually.”
“I guess it’s a good sign.”
“I’ll say,” he said. “If it hadn’t stopped I’d have bled out.”
“No, it’s a good sign they did what they did.”
“You mean they just wanted to teach me a lesson?” He chuckled at his bloody foot. “To toe the line?”
She nodded, her copper hair sweeping down over a bare shoulder. “They must value you being alive.”
“Maybe I can demand better accommodation.”
She smiled. “Wouldn’t push it, buster.”
“And how’s the…” He indicated his chest, then blushed suddenly awkward. “I mean have…”
“The cuts on my breasts? They’re healing, Ed.”
“Was that punishment too?”
“Nah, they did that for fun.” She flicked back her hair. “They do all kinds of freaky things for fun.”
“Like when they made you put your hands through the loops?”
“We decided early on that it would be bad etiquette to ask each other what they did.”
“But I—”
“We decided it was a way to maintain at least some small area of privacy.”
“We?”
She sighed and shook her head. Her eyes took on a sad, downward cast as she remembered. “There were others when I first got here. I even shared this cage with another girl. One by one they all…” She shrugged. “They were all taken but me.”
“And Marco?”
“He was brought in later.”
“So you decided you wouldn’t talk about how they abused you?”
“Our captors call the shots. I’ve told you.”
“So you go along with it?”
“Have to. If you want to live.”
He moved his foot as he sat on the mattress. It had started to throb again. Where the little toe had rooted to his foot was now a gooey red-black scab.
“They cut off my little toe,” he said.
“I know. You’ve already told me.”
“When they make me lie up on that shelf, they tell me to put my penis through a hole in the glass roof of the cage. Then they—”
“Ed.” She looked at him pleadingly. “What our captors do to us they do in the dark. It’s secret.”
“Then whoever it was sucked me. Then stuck my cock inside of them.”
She turned away, briefly burying her face in the blanket.
He continued. “I was forced to have sex… but get this, I loved it. They excited me. It was great sex. I was really turned on.”
She sat, resting her elbow on her knee. She gazed at him with those green eyes for a moment, then shook her head. “I know what you’re doing.”
“You do?”
“You’re saying we should share the experiences of what they do to us.”
“Keeping it secret doesn’t help.”
“So if we share, if we confess, it makes us stronger?”
“Yes. But there’s nothing to confess. We’ve done nothing wrong. But if we tell each other what happens to us… the abuse we suffer… then we’re not so isolated. We can lend one another emotional support.”
She nodded. “Guess we might as well. After all, the old way wasn’t that effective, was it now? Remember what happened to Marco?”
He looked at her.
She said, “So you think I should tell you what they did to me?”
“I can’t force you to talk.”
“No… well… it’s…” She took a deep breath. Then making a decision, she spoke in a no-nonsense way. “The last time they made me their plaything, I was orde
red to stand facing the bars of the cage. In the dark they must have hooked loops to the bars. They made me put my hands in.”
“You were restrained by the loops?”
She nodded. “Like lassoes. They pulled tight around my wrists. Then they began touching me.”
“Hurting?”
“No. Gentle.”
“Was there anything about the hands?”
“You mean anything distinctive about them? Anything identifiable?”
“It might help us later.”
“You mean when it comes to identifying them for the cops?” She gave a sour laugh. “Some hope, Ed. Anyway, here comes the confession Hollywood-style. They touched my body. Stroking me up and down. Then they ran their hands up inside my thighs to between my legs. They worked at me with their fingers.” She looked at me defiantly. “There. Does that supply the picture for you?”
“I have to ask this, Virginia. Did they rape you?”
“Direct kinda guy, huh?”
“It could be important.”
“No,” she said. “They haven’t. Always fingers.”
“Nothing eke?”
“No, always fingers. But there’s something else.”
“Go on.”
“They were small, slender. I’m sure they were a woman’s.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah, so you heard what you thought you heard.” She looked me in the eye. “You heard a red-hot lesbian lust fest.”
Ed blushed.
“Does that turn you on?” Her voice sounded hard. “Did you get all horny as you listened in the dark?”
“Virginia, I didn’t—”
“ ‘Course you heard. That’s what made you pop your cap too soon. But more fool you, they hacked off your toe for that mistake.”
“Virginia, I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what? For being a horny teenager?” She pursed her lips as if ready to shoot some insults. Then she let out her pent-up breath. “No, I’m sorry.” Her eyes softened. “You see, I don’t get out much. Makes me cranky.” Her lips twitched into a faint smile. “Forgive me, Ed?”
“Nothing to forgive. But we’ve learnt one thing. We need to stick together.”
Then she caught him by surprise. Letting the blanket fall from her, she crossed the cage to the bars nearest him. Her heavy breasts swayed. He allowed his eyes to take her in. She was naked with the exception of the cutoffs. Her hair coiled down; heavy strands slipped over her shoulder to brush her nipples.
Ed imagined the sensation must have been a pleasant tickle.
The cuts were healing fast now.
Boy, she looked good. Despite everything, her face glowed. She looked healthy. Vibrant.
She knelt down against the bars. Slipped her hand through. Reached out to him.
“Ed, will you hold my hand, please?”
“Be my pleasure.”
Avoiding catching the raw wound on his foot, he slid across the floor until he sat near the bars. He stretched out to her. Took her hand. She grasped his tightly. He squeezed back.
Suddenly the pressure of her hand in his became the most beautiful thing in the world.
“Partners?” she asked.
“Partners,” he agreed.
Time passed. Ed Lake’s foot healed. During this time the funky games continued in the beast house. The lights would go out. Sometimes it was Virginia who got the attention. Sometimes Ed.
He kept his strength up so he could perform.
And performances went on for hours. He’d lay on his back on the platform.
Either it was the hungry mouth that worked his cock, or it was the equally ravenous orifice.
But he was certain it was a woman now.
Of course he never saw. Too dark.
And he never let himself orgasm until his captor had been sated.
Afterward, whatever had been done to them, Ed would talk to Virginia. They shared their experiences. They discussed every detail—what their captor did, how they smelled, how they felt. Whether their captor climaxed. Whether Virginia or Ed climaxed.
Did it feel good?
Did it feel bad?
Sometimes it was so bad it was great.
Talking helped. Talking made them stronger.
They began to discuss how they could strike back.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
It came for him. It staggered, legs moving with awkward stiffness, an arm reaching out.
He backed away, breathless with horror.
Backed into waiting arms.
Crying out, he spun and stared into Hydra’s leering half-face. Naked, she fell to her knees. She clutched his erection. She guided it slowly toward her face.
“Fuck my brains out,” she said. Laughing, she eased him into her head. He felt the tissues part around his stiff organ.
Heard the squish.
“Hey! Hey!”
Somebody shook Imad.
“You okay?” a woman’s voice asked through the darkness.
He sat up, turned on the bedside lamp. The woman beside him swung up an arm to shield her eyes. She lay on top of the sheets. She was older than Imad and bony. Her skin was slick with suntan oil; a coconut oil that smelled rich and inviting. He remembered their encounter at the beach, where he’d offered to rub the oil on her back—and she’d accepted. He remembered bringing her home, drinks, a meal, and taking her to bed, where they oiled their bodies and wrestled in an endless slippery contest of lust.
“Louise,” he murmured, at last remembering her name.
She uncovered her face. A handsome face with thin lips and high cheekbones and clear blue eyes. She gave him a tentative smile. “Are you all right?”
“I dreamed.” He smiled. Shrugged. “It was nothing.”
“It sounded just awful.”
“We all have our crosses to bear, do we not?”
“That’s for sure. Me included.”
“I apologize for waking you. However…” He smiled. “Since we are both awake now and the night is young…” He massaged one of her small, soft breasts.
She held his hand as if she wished to keep it there always. “The night isn’t all that young, Imad. I’m afraid I have to be on my way.”
“No.”
“I really hate to go, but I’ve got a job to get to.”
“At this hour?” he asked. “It’s nearly eleven.”
“Yeah. I go on at twelve. Waitress over at Clyde’s. You know, Clyde’s? Has this dumb sign out front. ‘Twenty-four-hour Service Day or Night’?” She laughed softly. “Anyway, it’s been cool.”
Turning onto her side, she kissed him long and hard.
She was gone. Alone in the huge house, Imad went to the wet bar and poured himself a glass of gin. He took it to the couch, sat back, used the remote to turn on the television. He pressed the buttons, watching a few seconds of each broadcast before turning to the next.
He settled for an adventure show in which a lithe brunette was being pursued by a gunman. She wore a T-shirt and shorts. Imad was pleased to notice that she wore no bra. He watched the breasts dance as she ran.
Then she hid and knocked the gunman unconscious with a flowerpot.
Rather silly, but Imad enjoyed the view of the woman, and was disappointed to see the show end.
A frowning, white-haired man came on. “In just a few minutes, on Eyewitness News at eleven, we’ll tell you about a miraculous rescue at sea, the President’s latest energy proposal, and a bizarre double murder at one of our local museums. This and more from Bonnie, Lenny, and me after a brief time-out.”
Imad watched the museum story. The cops behind the crime scene tape, forensic specialists moving around in their white coveralls. Views of the Callahan room. A close-up of the empty mummy casket. Then Imad went upstairs to the safe. He opened it. Removed the small black notebook.
He glanced at the title page and shivered.
The Memoirs of Robert Callahan.
THE MEMOIRS OF ROBERT CALLAHAN
THE FEARFUL D
ESCENT
Though I wish, for reasons that will shortly be obvious, to prevent my Egyptian activities from coming to the public’s attention, I find myself compelled to record the extraordinary events surrounding the discovery of the mummy Amara. I shall take precautions that these pages remain concealed during my lifetime and the lifetime of my dear wife, Sarah. If eyes other than my own are now reading this manuscript, it may be assumed that we have both met our final fate. Disclosure of my activities cannot harm us now, and may serve to prevent further tragedies.
In the year 1926, my father and I traveled to Egypt for the purpose of lending his expert assistance to the famed Howard Carter, who had recently unearthed the tomb of the boy king, Tutankhamen.
In Luxor, we met Mr. Carter. He welcomed my father heartily, for they worked together several years earlier with Theodore Davis at the tomb of Mentuhotep I. He was not so enthusiastic, however, about my presence. He must have felt that my youth of eighteen years, no matter how mature my attitude to work, would prove of hindrance. I am pleased to record that his attitude in this matter changed remarkably once he saw how I aided my father in the intricate details of his work. My copious, exact notes soon earned Mr. Carter’s respect.
It was my bravery, however, that won the respect of the Egyptian youth Maged. We met on a December night. Suffering from the oppressive heat, I wandered beyond the boundaries of our encampment in hopes of chancing upon a stray, cooling breeze. I longed for the winters of my Wisconsin childhood: to be sledding down a slope, a chill wind battering my face, snowflakes blowing, the night lit by a full moon! I was near weeping with frustration when suddenly an urgent cry entered my consciousness.
Never one to flee in the face of a crisis, I rushed forward and discovered half-a-dozen youths engaged in battering a young fellow senseless. I attacked. In the brief affray that followed, I struck several telling blows on the bullies and sent them scurrying for safety.
Maged introduced himself, using passable English (his father, I learned, had served with the British during the Great War). He offered me his gratitude and his friendship.
At first, he explained that the boys had fallen upon him for the purpose of committing robbery. After our friendship had grown, however, he finally confided in me. It seems that Maged, no innocent victim, had made vile suggestions to the sister of one of the boys. When she refused him, the young Maged showed his hostility by defecating on the family’s doorstep. It is no wonder that her brother and several of his comrades reacted with violence.
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