God Stones: Books 1 - 3

by Otto Schafer

  He needed to see Garrett and Lenny right away.

  10

  Clearing Stones

  Present day

  Oak Island, Nova Scotia

  Breanne’s body jolted into consciousness as she sucked in a startled gasp. She looked from side to side, trying to understand where she was. The fire cracked loudly, throwing sparkling embers into the air like miniature fireworks. When she recognized this as the sound from her sleep, her pulse slowed and she settled back into the camp chair, pulling her throw blanket tightly to her chest. Her back ached from the chair, or maybe from the day’s work with the shovel – probably both. She was too exhausted to make the trip from fireside to the camper, despite her protesting lower back, and decided instead to stay in the chair, at least for a little longer. Besides, the campfire saturated her in warmth, too difficult to abandon on this chilly night. In the background, she recognized one of her father’s favorites, Coltrane’s “My One and Only Love,” playing softly. Softer still, somewhere under the carpet of melody, she could just barely make out voices from inside the camper, where her brothers were engaged in what must have been an intense game of spades. Focusing on the dancing flames, she felt her eyelids sag as she allowed Coltrane to softly lull her back to sleep with his sax.

  The next time Breanne woke, it was to the whisper of her father’s voice as he tapped her shoulder. “Bre, baby girl, it’s time to turn in. We’ve another early day tomorrow.”

  She was reluctant to move, her body having found just the right position, so she moaned disapprovingly instead.

  Her father responded with a sigh. “Baby girl, you can’t sleep in the chair. You need a good night’s rest – in a bed.”

  With some effort, she cracked open an eye and surveyed her surroundings. Where once a crackling campfire had washed the campsite in dancing firelight, now only a dull amber glow remained. She could no longer hear her brothers’ voices, and even Coltrane had put away his saxophone for the evening. “What time is it, Daddy?” she rasped before clearing her dry throat.

  “Bre, it’s not even late anymore, it’s early,” he said, smiling lovingly as he held out his hand.

  Stretching, she forced herself to open both eyes, then took his hand and stood reluctantly, smiling back at her father. “What are you still doing up? I’m not the only one with an early day coming.”

  “I was on a conference call with Sarah. We had a lot to go over. It seems her team finally finished clearing the tunnel, along with most of the cave containing the sacrificial children. But it sounds like they won’t be able to get to the skeletons – apparently, a giant chunk of the mountain crushed them.” He guided Breanne gently by the arm, back towards the camper entrance. “Any day they should be at the huge archway and lintel. Sarah said they have been able to make good progress in that direction. I’m not holding my breath, but I’m really hoping some of the pottery and lintel survived the collapse. As far as the other direction goes, they were only able to…” He paused at the metal steps leading into the camper. “You’re not hearing any of this, are you?”

  “No, I am… really,” she said, trying desperately to show she was paying attention, but her heavy eyes betrayed her. A great struggle was being waged between her interest and her eyelids, and her eyelids were winning.

  “This can wait till morning. Now off to bed with you,” he said with a chuckle.

  How could you do it? How could you kill your own mother, Breanne!

  Breanne gasped, lurched, and choked back a sob. She gasped again. Fire, and her mother’s voice clear as death. She threw her head side to side, squeezing her eyes shut, willing it away. She sucked in deep and smelled fire. Her eyes popped open in wide-eyed panic. She expected to see flames, feel heat, but there was nothing, just her bed and the camper. Her brows pinched. There was no fire in the crash that had taken her mother. Yet she could smell it, sooty and black. It was there, real and fresh, as if the room were filled with ash.

  She calmed, and breathed steady. Slowly the echo of her mother’s voice was replaced by the sounds of laughter. The soot in her nostrils faded, too, replaced by the smell of bacon, eggs, and grits. She sat back, realizing she didn’t even remember when or how she had gotten to bed.

  The voices outside told her that her brothers were already up, and the camp was a bustle of activity. She was used to her father’s dig sites resembling an ant colony as students, fellow archeologists, and excavation teams scurried around camp all throughout the day. But that wasn’t the case on Oak Island. This site was different. There was no team other than her, her brothers, and her dad. Oh, and of course, the weekly visit from Jerry. Usually, she beat them all out of bed, but not today.

  She pushed herself up onto her elbows and could see the faint early morning glow coming through the small camper window. She still felt tired but she knew one thing for sure: she had no intention of closing her eyes. She lay there a moment longer, shaking off the nightmare. Then she remembered what today was, and excitement quickly replaced sleepiness. She threw back her blanket, the promise of a new mystery to solve propelling her out of bed.

  A few minutes later there was a rapping sound on the camper door followed by Edward’s voice. “Sis, you decent?”

  “Yep.”

  The door popped open. “Well, it’s about time you get up. Sleeping in, today of all days?”

  “No freaking way, I just stayed up too late last night. Too excited, I guess.”

  “Yeah, I guess, if you call sawing logs in a camp chair staying up late,” he said with a laugh.

  “Whatever! I was not snoring!” Bre found one of her socks and slid it on. “You know what sucks about this place? The dig site is so secret I can’t even tell my friends about this place when I write them. I mean, what’s the point of being on a really cool secret dig when you can’t even tell anyone?”

  “You know Pops is going to let you publish with him, right? Think about it – you will be a published archeologist before you even finish college. Picture this, you get to college right around the time this story breaks and boom, you become famous!”

  Breanne laughed. “You’re crazy! And I think you’re getting a little ahead of yourself.” But the thought was exciting. The possibility of co-publishing with her dad. That would be epic. “Do you see my other sock?”

  He pointed under the kitchen table. “Over there.”

  She took the sock and pulled it on. “Hey, you know what I find odd about the site? How come this mystery stakeholder guy never comes around? Why all the secrecy? Why can’t we meet this guy?” She pulled her braids back to bind them with a stretchy hair band. “I know Dad presses Jerry about it. Even he knows this arrangement is weird.”

  “Have you been listening to Pops’s calls with Jerry again?”

  “Well, yeah, but it’s not like I’m eavesdropping.”

  “Maybe the guy is famous or something. Some rich celebrity who doesn’t want to be associated with this publicly.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Oh, I know! Maybe it’s Bill Gates! He’s loaded,” Edward teased. “Or maybe it isn’t a guy at all. Maybe it’s Oprah! I mean, the person funding this has a money-is-no-problem-the-sky’s-the-limit attitude.”

  Breanne laughed. “You’re stupid, you know that?”

  Edward feigned hurt feelings.

  “Seriously, Ed, you have to admit it is weird.”

  “Sure, it is. But the guy is just private, that’s all,” Edward said assuredly. “No more worry talk. This is a celebration. Yesterday was a big deal, Bre – we found it. Finally, we found it.”

  She knew her brother was right. They had been digging that damn hole so deep, for so long, that she honestly had begun to wonder whether her father’s calculations were correct or if they would keep going until they hit bedrock. Of course, he was correct on the location of where to dig within a few feet of his calculation. The depth, however, was so much deeper than anyone could have imagined.

  “Well, at least this ought to settle Jerry do
wn for a while. Have you noticed how worn down he looks?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I think the pressure from his boss must be getting to him.”

  “I think the strain between him and Dad isn’t helping either. The arguing during their conference calls is getting even worse.”

  Edward furrowed his brow in disapproval as he turned towards the camper door.

  “What? Camper walls are thin,” she said before shoving her toothbrush into her mouth.

  Turning back, he grinned. “Let me guess – it went something like, ‘By the queen’s knickers, don’t get all wonky on me, Charles. You bloody hell know that’s not what I want!’”

  She spit her toothpaste in the sink in a fit of laughter. Her brother had flawlessly mastered Jerry’s British accent. “Ha! Yep! And you know Dad was like, ‘I won’t be rushed into making foolish mistakes further compromising this site, Jerry! You’d better not rush me, Jerry – I’ll be off this site so fast it’ll make your head spin, Jerry!’” she said, summoning her deepest voice.

  Edward laughed. “Listen, when you’re finished primping for your date with the dirt pit, breakfast is ready.”

  Hastily, she ate breakfast as she packed her daypack. Then, quickly pulling on her steel-toed boots, she grabbed the last of her gear and was ready to go. Her brothers and father had already made their way over to the pit area and were doing pre-workday safety equipment checks on the crane, including the cables, bucket, and basket.

  Today Breanne was surprised to find Jerry was at the site and manning the controls to the crane – a job that usually belonged to Paul, heavy-equipment-operator extraordinaire.

  “Jerry, you will be fine,” Paul said. “It isn’t like you will be digging with it. You are simply lowering us down and pulling us out, and that is only if the remote system fails, which is highly unlikely. Really, it’s just an added precaution so we can all be in the pit today.”

  “I bloody hope you realize I have never used heavy equipment in my life,” Jerry said with concern.

  “Jerry, stand out there on the viewing platform where you have a good visual of the bottom and simply press this one for up.” Paul pointed at the control.

  “My dear boy, I am not a huge fan of heights.” Jerry said uneasily.

  “There’s a guard rail, Jerry. You will be perfectly safe,” Paul said, giving Jerry’s shoulder a slap.

  Breanne leaned in close to her father. “Dad, you sure about having Jerry run the controls?”

  “It was this, or I was going to make you stay up top and do it,” he said seriously.

  She drew back.

  “Look, I need your brothers’ muscle for moving these stones, but I knew you would Daddy the hell out of me. And besides, we should all be down there for this.”

  Breanne kissed her father’s cheek. “Thanks, Dad. Like I was saying, Jerry is a good choice.” She winked.

  “Uh-huh,” he grumbled.

  Paul pointed towards the pit. “Pops, I took a load of tools and a pile of four-by-fours down. We have plenty of room on the pit floor to spend the entire day pulling stones and stacking them if we have to. But if the pile gets too big and we start to run out of room, I’ll switch the basket out with the clamshell, and we’ll have to spend a day hauling them up.”

  Her father smiled. “Hopefully we aren’t pulling rocks that long. Now let’s get started!”

  Her father allowed less finesse in the excavation of the tunnel this time. Since he knew what it was and that they were going to have to cut through the wood structure to gain access, there was really no need to be overly careful. As they cleared the dirt off the top of the wood, they noted it looked the same as it did over in the swamp. A solid wooden structure held together by wood pegs. Then as they uncovered the tunnel to the furthest eastward section nearest to the pit wall, they noticed that gaps started to appear between the timbers, maybe a couple inches wide. Between the gaps, they could see a fibrous material.

  “Pops, what is this?” Edward asked, shoving his fingers into the crack between the timbers and pulling out some of the fiber pinched between two fingers.

  Breanne had spent her whole winter immersing herself in Oak Island’s history. She had even watched all the reality shows and researched every theory she could find on the internet. She recognized right away what her brother was holding. “Dad! Come look at this!” she called.

  “What you got there?” he asked, laying a handsaw down on a pile of boards.

  “That’s coconut fiber, isn’t it?”

  “I’ll be damned if it isn’t!”

  “So, what’s the big deal?” Edward asked.

  “They put it there to act as a filter between the dirt and rocks. This fiber keeps the cracks from filling with dirt and sealing,” Breanne said excitedly.

  Edward shook his head, puzzled, as he inspected the fiber. “But I don’t understand. Why would they need to prevent the cracks from filling a tunnel they buried anyway?”

  Her father smiled a great big smile. “Because they wanted water from the swamp to be able to pass through this tunnel, then come out through these cracks and flood the area. And do you know why they wanted the water to flood this specific area?”

  Edward smiled.

  Paul snapped his fingers. “We’re close!”

  “Indeed, we are,” her father said. “The only reason for them to construct these gaps in the wood is to allow water to run through, and the only reason for the builders to do that is to flood this particular area. They are protecting something, and we’re damn close! Bre, let’s bag some of this fiber. I want to get it off to the lab for analysis.” Motioning to his son, he said, “Ed, let’s pop the top.”

  Breanne nodded and began collecting samples.

  Edward positioned himself onto his knees next to the tunnel and as close to the wall as he could. Using a cordless reciprocating saw, he began cutting through each timber one by one, stopping occasionally to remove any chunks of coconut fiber threatening to bind in the saw blade. Within a few minutes, he had opened a hole big enough to climb through, and one by one, they began removing stones until Paul was fully inside the tunnel.

  They spent the rest of the morning pulling rocks out of the hole to the sounds of Motown on cassette. Paul lifted each stone up and over the side of the hole before plopping it onto the pit floor with a thud. Breanne helped with the ones she could handle. Edward, who looked like he spent his spare time in the gym doing squats and dead lifts and who had grown into a beast of a man at six two and 230 pounds, effortlessly plucked each large stone from the ground and carried it across the pit, idly tossing them into a pile. A few times, Charles offered to give him a break and carry rocks, but Edward wasn’t about to let his pops carry the large rocks. “I got this, Pops – I like the workout.” By the time lunch rolled around, they had a pretty good pile going.

  “How are we looking in there, Paul?” Charles shouted through the opening.

  Paul shouted back from a few feet down the tunnel. “Muddy as all hell, and I think I need to put in a brace, Pops. I’m not trusting this structure.”

  “Okay, well, I have the four-by-fours cut to the measurements you asked for – but after lunch. Let’s get you out and head topside to eat.”

  Breanne lay down on her belly next to the hole and poked her head inside.

  “Don’t even think about going in there, Bre,” her father said.

  “I’m just looking,” she said innocently. She was surprised at just how much of the tunnel Paul had cleared. She clicked her flashlight on and pointed it towards her brother, illuminating his back as he squatted in front of the stacked stones, preparing to grab another one.

  “For real, I am starving,” Paul said. He hefted a small boulder free and froze.

  “What is it, Paul?” she asked.

  “There is no stone behind this one.” He placed the stone on the soggy floor of the tunnel behind him, then turned back and grabbed another.

  Breanne’s pulse quickened.

  He repeated
this twice more. He looked back at her with disappointment. “I think we hit a dead end.”

  “What did he say?” her father asked.

  “A dead end,” she said, her face dropping.

  “From what I can tell, there is a wooden wall with gaps just like there are on the top of the tunnel. Wait… wait just a second.” He pulled another large stone from in front of the newly discovered wall.

  “Daddy, you better get over here.” Breanne couldn’t tell what had her brother so excited, but he was frantic now as he slapped palm to stone again and again, heaving, tugging, and tossing until he had cleared away enough to see whatever had caught his eye.

  “What did you find?” Charles asked, rushing over to the hole and dropping to his knees next Breanne.

  “Um, Pops! Sis! I think lunch is going to have to wait!”

  Edward, hearing the commotion, tossed a stone into the pile and hurried over. “What did he find?”

  Paul popped his head up through the access hole in the wood tunnel. “The stones stop, and it’s just a wall with the same gaps like in the top and sides, but there’s something else, Pops!” Paul swallowed.

  “Well, what is it?”

  “Mounted to the wall from top to bottom and side to side… it’s… it’s a giant cross!”

  Her father’s eyes went wide. “A cross!”

  “But it looks weird.”

  Breanne stuck her head back into the hole and shone her light past her brother, illuminating the end of the tunnel and… the cross.

  “Weird – what do you mean weird?” he asked.

  “Well, it flares out on the ends and gets really wide, but narrower towards the center. I don’t know, Pops, it just looks weird,” Paul said, shrugging with excitement.

  “My God, son, it sounds like you’re describing a cross pattée.”

  “A cross pat what?” Edward asked.

  But before he could answer, Bre shouted, “A medieval cross! I see it, Daddy! It’s really there! It’s huge!” She yanked her head from the opening. “It’s really there!”