They found the stairs almost immediately, but it wasn’t until about nine in the evening when they cleared enough dirt to find the rough mud brick wall at the base of it. It took the laborers little time to punch through the wall. As the bricks fell inward a rush of stale air escaped from inside.
Kathleen knew this was going to be the most amazing thing she had ever found. It would change her life forever. She waited impatiently as they pulled the rest of the bricks up and out of the hole. In no time, they had cleared a rough-hewn doorway leading into a dark chamber.
As soon as the last of the bricks were clear, Kathleen took a lantern and started down the stairs. Mitch was close behind her. As the light from the lantern illuminated the chamber, Kathleen’s breath caught. What she saw was like some picture on the cover of some fantasy fiction novel.
The chamber was roughly hewn; however, the walls were smooth as if someone had taken at least some time to make it look cared for. There was very little dust and not a single cobweb, so the room had been sealed, untouched by time. On the left wall was an oak nightstand, with an oval frame behind it. A stone bowl sat against one wall, probably used for washing she gathered. On the right side of the room was a large bed, but what was on the bed is what had made her breath stop. On top of the bed lay a woman. Not a skeleton. A woman.
An appreciative whistle passed through Mitch’s lips, which made her jump.
“Sorry.” Mitch looked at her apologetically.
Kathleen looked back at the bed, half expecting the whistle to have woken the woman, even though logic told her the woman had to be long dead. She moved a little closer and realized why Mitch whistled. The woman was startlingly beautiful. She had long black hair framing her regal appearing face. Her high cheek bones and full lips would have any runway model jealous. The woman’s body was as near perfect as they come, except for the stab wound below her breast. Kathleen wondered who this woman was when she heard Mitch whistle quietly from the back of the chamber.
“Will you look at this?” His eyes gleamed in the lantern light as they met hers. “There is some kind of etching over here, though I don’t recognize the language.”
Kathleen made her way over.
“It’s ancient Gaelic. I recognize the script, but my Gaelic is very rusty. I will need some time to workthis out.” Her fingers traced the script from start to finish. It wasn’t until she reached the last word that she noticed the light reflect off something below it. She brought the light closer and saw there were more words written underneath the etchings. The words were faded but somewhat glossy — as if written in…
“Mitch, look at this. There is more below. And it looks to be written in blood.”
Mitch squinted at the wall. Reached out and touched it, and quickly pulled his fingers back.
“No way.” Mitch sounded shocked.
“What?” she asked.
“It’s still wet.” He pulled and tugged at his finger to remove the blood.
“Impossible. There is no way it could still be wet after all this…” Her voice trailed off as her fingers brushed against the stone and felt them adhere slightly.
“What the hell have we found?” Mitch asked in awe.
“I have no idea,” she replied. “But I’m gonna figure it out.”
Ten hours later, after returning to the hotel, gathering her books on ancient Gaelic, and catching some sleep, found Kathleen sitting in front of the wall. Electrical cords spider-webbed the room as work lights illuminated the area from multiple angles. Books lay open to varying pages in a semi-circle around Kathleen. Papers with words written, crossed out, and re-written on them lay strewn upon the floor. Kathleen sat, had sat for about three hours. Her lower back hurt from leaning over books and papers.
She had not left this spot for a long time, and only occasionally did she look up. She had effectively translated most of the whole etching. And what she had translated so far, had a little bit unnerved her. She had read prophecies before, and most of them were vague. This one was surprisingly succinct and that is what frightened her. It shouldn’t be. Prophecy was usually some crazy person who saw patterns in history and guessed something similar would happen in the future. Usually, they were end of time things or great catastrophes.
This was neither. This was a case of when this happens then this will happen— that simple. Even if the events were damn near impossible, well at least the second part was, it still bothered her. She pretty much had gotten the gist of the etching. Now she had to start on the blood writing. She didn’t think it was from the same person, which was odd. It must be by the person who had killed the woman.
She glanced over her shoulder at the body of the woman who was lying on the bed. It still amazed her the body was intact. Not only intact, but her hair and nails had not grown, it was like at the moment of her death she went into stasis. Kathleen looked back at the etching. Yeah, it bothered her. Not only was the woman on the bed in stasis, but the blood on the wall was still wet, another impossibility.
All these impossibilities compounded with the prophecy. She was never one to believe in the mystical. Scientifically, mystical didn’t exist. But this… this was something that, for her, bordered on mystical. She heard a shuffle behind her.
“Hey Mitch, I translated the etchings and you aren’t going to believe what they say…”
“Why? What do they say?” A voice sounded behind her, a voice most definitely not Mitch’s.
“Samuel!” Kathleen bounded up and turned around to see Samuel standing there. He didn’t look happy.
“I asked you to wait before you used the GPR,”
“I know, but I couldn’t! You know how I get when I’m just about to find something. After all this time, I was right! I knew there was something here.”
He continued to look at her. He had a strange look in his eyes. She almost thought she saw sadness there, but she couldn’t for the life of her figure out what he would be sad about.
“What does it say?” he asked.
“You aren’t going to believe me.”
“Try me.”
She paused at that. She noticed he really hadn’t taken the time to look around at all. Not even at the woman on the bed. All his attention was on her.
“Well,” she started and turned back to the wall and her fingers across the etchings as she read them.
“It says ‘When the time comes. Nature will make the call and the last stone of the Calendar will fall. When it lies upon the ground I will return, body healed and alive. My, something, I don’t know what that word is, will return from the blood of their blood.” She stopped at that. “Well, that is what I believe it says anyway. My Old Gaelic is rusty, and these books weren’t much help. I haven’t had time to start on the words in blood underneath.”
“You have it almost perfectly translated,” Samuel said from right behind her. There definitely was a hint of sadness in his voice. She hadn’t even heard him approach. Then what he said reached her. How would he know what the etching said? She was about to turn, to ask when she felt a sharp pain explode from her spine. She tried to gasp for breath but found her lungs wouldn’t take in any air. All she could do was make quiet whimpering noises as her strength left her and she slid to the floor. As she landed on the floor, she looked up to see Samuel standing above her with a bloodied knife in his hand. Her blood.
“Why didn’t you wait for me, Kate?” he asked sadly, looking down at her.
“I didn’t want to have to do this Kate. I really liked you. If you had just done as I asked and not started without me.” The sadness in his eyes left and was replaced by anger. “But you didn’t. You had to go and dig this up. After all these years I have spent protecting this secret and you had to ruin it. Now I must clean this mess up and somehow cover it up so no one will look into it further. It would have been much easier to have just convinced you to leave it alone.” He walked away.
Her last thoughts as her sight faded was ‘who was he?’
Samuel, or Syndo
r as he was once called, exited the chamber and made his way up the stairs to the outside. There were some people there who had returned to help with the find, assistants who were wandering about, not sure what to do. Syndor gathered them up.
“Kathleen just informed me the translation is taking longer than she suspected and she wanted you guys to go home. Hopefully, she will be a little further along tomorrow. As for now, since I am here, she doesn’t need anything from you guys.”
The assistants looked a little confused as they gazed at each other. After all, they didn’t really know this guy. Syndor looked more intently at them. Slowly each of them met his eyes, and locked gazes with him. It wasn’t until they were all loaded into their vehicles and halfway home, they realized something odd had happened.
Syndor looked back at the entrance. How was he going to fix this? He had gotten lax. He should have turned her aside a long time ago. Instead he had let his feelings for her influence him. That had never happened before. Always, he had watched over who was looking into the Calendar. Always had wormed his way into their lives and convinced them to look elsewhere. Or, when he had to, killed them.
He hadn’t been able to turn Kathleen.
She had been too determined. Stronger means of turning would have hurt her and changed who she was. He hadn’t been prepared to do that unless it was entirely necessary, which it ended up being. In haste, he had left his job and driven down here. But she had already found the room, and worse, had already translated the inscription. He couldn’t risk someone finding out what it said and finding a way to stop it. So, he had to kill her. It may have been too late. Too many people knew of the chamber and even more knew of the etchings. He had already taken care of Mitch, but he was sure Mitch had called the University to inform them of what they had found. Luckily, unbeknownst to Syndor, he didn’t have to worry about it for long.
The paramedics didn’t really know how to explain it. The man in the room had obviously been bitten and there was no doubt it was by a snake, and that snake had been poisonous. The thing that was unexplainable about it was there were no poisonous snakes in England.
“His name is Mitch York,” the hotel manager said from the doorway. “He was fine yesterday when he came back.”
“Have you had any reports of snakes in here?” The medic asked.
“In my hotel? Are you nuts? I keep a clean hotel, sirs. Why would there be any snakes in here?”
“Good question. But this man was obviously bitten by one, and a pretty nasty one. That’s what killed him.” The medic turned the body’s ankle towards the manager so he could see the blackened area around the two fang marks above the body’s ankle.
The manager turned away.
“Well, I will call an exterminator right away! Can’t be having snakes in my hotel scaring all the guests.” He turned to leave and was knocked to the ground.
The shaking started.
The earthquake was remarkable. Not only for the size of the earthquake, but also for the fact England is not prone to earthquakes of any size. The other thing making it remarkable, the real devastation of the quake was only witnessed by one person. Syndor fell to the ground and watched the stones of the Calendar collapse. He smiled. Kestrel has returned.
The rain beat down on Mark’s sedan as he wove in and out of traffic. The windshield wipers barely made any headway clearing the rain from the windshield. He knew he should probably slow down, but his wife, Amy’s short forceful breathing in the backseat made him keep up the speed. Their little baby boy was on the way, and Mark couldn’t be happier.
He remembered when Amy told him she was pregnant a little over eight months ago. He stood for about two minutes it seemed with his mouth wide open, and then finally sat down for another five with his mouth still open. After all, the doctors had been adamant about Amy not being able to have kids.
The news came at the right time, too. They had just met with an adoption attorney two weeks ago and were waiting to see if they were eligible. Amy held his hands and looked in his eyes with the biggest smile he had ever seen on her face. This is exactly what they wanted; they just never thought they were going to get it. A honking horn broke Mark’s revelry and brought him back to the here and now as he swerved slightly to miss the car that had slid a little into the lane. Luckily, at four a.m. there weren’t too many cars out and the streets of Topeka were empty.
“Just two more blocks to the hospital, honey.” A sharp cry from the backseat made him glance back at his wife’s sweaty, but beautiful face that was slightly pudgy from the extra pounds she put on during the pregnancy. She hadn’t gained too much, but enough to fill out a face that was normally tight skinned with a well-defined bone structure. Black hair was disheveled from the early morning awakening.
His wife was of an average height, so she fit almost comfortably lying down on the back seat. Her blue eyes showed brightly from the passing streetlights as she forced shallow breaths out quickly.
“Just keep breathing like they showed us.”
“Honey just drive. Okay?”
He looked back out the front, fortunately, because he almost missed the turn. Bright lights from the hospital glowed ahead as he approached and slowed to make the turn safely. He wheeled his car around and onto the road that lead to emergency. The car slid slightly as he tapped the brakes and then came to a stop a little past the overhang. He put the car into reverse and backed up slightly so when Amy got out, she wouldn’t get soaked.
“Just wait right here, sweetie.”
“Like I’m going anywhere.” He heard her reply caustically.
He slammed the car door and ran to the hospital’s automatic door. The doors opened with a whoosh and he ran in, blasted by air conditioning that immediately made the hair on his arms stand up. Why were hospitals always so frickin’ cold he wondered as he approached the desk and skidded to a halt.
“Can I help you, sir?” The woman behind the desk asked, giving him the once over and seeing he wasn’t the one who needed any help.
“My wife is giving birth, and she is out front, so I need help. Well, she needs help. Well, we both do.” He realized he was babbling, but his wife was giving birth to his son, so he felt he had an excuse.
“Of course, sir.” She motioned to an orderly. He brought around a wheelchair and followed Mark outside to his car. With the orderly’s help, Amy sat in the wheelchair and they made their way inside. The orderly pushed her past the reception desk and started down one of the halls.
“Sir, I’m going to need some information from you first.” The lady motioned him back to the desk and he was forced to watch the orderly take his wife further down the hall, turn and disappeared.
“Sure. Yeah. What do you need?”
“Name?”
“Mark Abrams.”
“Wife’s name? She is your wife, right?”
“Amy. And yes, she is my wife.” At first, he was kind of indignant about that question, but realized there were probably more unmarried couples these days than married. A sad commentary on today’s society, he thought.
After a few more questions about insurance and such, he was shown to the waiting room for dads. There were a few others here as well. He sank into the cushioned chair of some weird green color. His long legs sprawled out in front of him.
Mark was a tall, lean man. His frame was wiry, and he had a sharp pointy nose that held dark rimmed bifocals. Even though he was in his late thirties, his eyesight started to fail at an early age. First distance, and then up close.
He ran his fingers through his light brown hair and felt it flop back down onto his forehead. He felt his body wanting to fall asleep or jump for joy and waited for it to tell him which it planned on doing. He took a moment to look around.
The hospital’s waiting room was, of course, painted in a soft, calming white, with pleasant landscape paintings hanging on the walls. Off to the left, one soon-to-be father tapped his foot and fidgeted with his jacket zipper, moving it up and down. Another was mess
ing around with his video camera, apparently, he brought it, but forgot to bring any tapes and had to call and wake some poor family member up to bring him one.
He was doing better than Mark.
He hadn’t even thought to bring anything. He wondered if he should wake someone up and see if they could bring one. He wondered if he even wanted to film Amy giving birth. He wanted to be there, but he wasn’t sure if it was something he wanted to see repeatedly. No. Better just to wait till the baby was out and resting in Amy’s arms to film it.
He glanced to his right and saw another soon-to-be dad, fast asleep. Well, we all deal with it in different ways he thought. He glanced up at the TV in the corner. It was some world news, Mideast war, some other rich movie star’s new rehab stint. He was just about to look away when the newscaster put a hand to her ear and stopped speaking for a moment. Must be someone telling her something important he gathered. She looked a little surprised and he could barely hear what she said next since the volume was lowered.
“Breaking news. There has been a very powerful earthquake that has stuck several miles from London. We go now to our London correspondent Jak Taylor.
The scene changed to a shot of a man standing in front of a collapsed building. The man whom the TV labeled as Jak Taylor, reporter, was a young man, who looked a bit shaken. He wore a largish black coat and gloves. The microphone he held in front of him was labeled channel 7. Mark stood up and approached the TV set to hear a little better. He couldn’t remember ever hearing about an earthquake in England and was interested in what Jak was about to say, when the door to Labor and Delivery opened.
“Mr. Abrams?” the man in the scrubs said as he peered out from behind the door.
Mark nodded.
“You can come in now. Your wife is about to give birth.”
Mark went for the door, following the man into Labor and Delivery and toward the room where his wife was.
The Awakening Box Set Page 4