God Stones: Books 1 - 3

by Otto Schafer

  Gabi gasped sharply, her breath catching.

  “What?” Sarah asked, following Gabi’s gaze skyward.

  “María Purísima,” Gabi whispered. With the exception of the water moving gently across the palms of her hands, the tiny gorge was frozen in absolute stillness as if captured in a single frame outside of time. But it was the full moon, swollen and imposing, that drew her attention. Its mellow radiance spilled over everything, bathing the small gorge in magic silver light.

  Without words both women gazed at the glowing orb as if for the first time in their lives. They didn’t need to speak to know each other’s thoughts. For only rare moments, and only when the moon was full, would it be positioned in such a way to shine underneath the rock outcropping and the long shaft they had escaped through. For them to pass by when they did, when the light from the moon was just so – the odds had to be astronomical. Had they passed by minutes from now or minutes earlier, the position would be different, and the way out would be invisible.

  Gabi knew without a doubt this was a gift from her parents. She thought the strange light she had seen in the water was the other side – heaven – but her parents were not bringing her to be with them. They were taking her away – away to live.

  Sarah turned and grabbed her, pulling her into her arms, wrapping her in them and squeezing. Gabi hugged her back with all she had. They stood there in the water for a long time, holding each other and sobbing.

  43

  Serpent

  Wednesday, April 6 – God Stones Day 1

  Petersburg, Illinois

  Garrett struggled to push his battered body across the current toward the sound of David’s voice. He was breathing hard as he pushed against the volume of water moving beneath him. It felt like a massive living creature, immensely powerful and completely unstoppable. In the dark, he couldn’t be sure how fast he was moving, but his instincts told him he was moving fast.

  In the distance he heard a low rumble that could only be water rushing through the busted dam. A strange hopelessness surrounded him. It felt as though any moment he would be swallowed. He wished he had a light. God, what he would give to be able to just see. Then he heard David’s voice again, but only barely – a gargled cry in the storm. He kicked even harder, a sharp pain forming in the back of his leg, deep in his hamstring.

  His greatest fear was that he would be washed over the dam before he made it to David, and that his friend would never know he had at least tried to save him. He tried to shout at David to just hold on, but his own shout was gargled as he sucked in the nasty river water. He gagged and coughed, then suddenly his hands struck mud below him. He had made it across.

  Unlike the opposite side of the river, this side tapered up gradually, disappearing into a small forest separating the river flood zone from viable farmland. Garrett scrambled to his feet, which were quickly drawn down into the mud. The river was making one last effort to keep him prisoner. He fought to break the clasp of invisible hands, each foot reluctantly pulling loose from the soul-sucking grasp of the mud. He finally made his way up onto more solid ground and bent forward to stretch as he shouted, “David! Where are you?”

  “I’m here!” David managed from somewhere upstream.

  Garrett stumbled forward toward David’s voice, finally finding the kid stuck several feet offshore, his whole body caught under a tangle of branches protruding from the water.

  “I’m here, David! I’m here. It’s going to be okay.”

  “Ah! Not okay!” David screamed, losing his grip on the branch.

  Garrett heard twigs snapping as David flailed to find purchase. Then nothing. Then a gasp. “Oh, please, Garrett! I can’t hold on!” He choked and gasped and began crying. “Please!” he moaned.

  Garrett stepped forward into the mud and began climbing out onto the brush pile, grabbing blindly for protruding branches as he worked his way slowly forward, David’s gargled sobs and the occasional flash of lightning guiding him. He was right over David when a flash illuminated his mustached face and little fingers as they grasped tight to a twig that shouldn’t have held. David’s face was a visage of terror, poking up just above the waterline.

  “Hold on, David! Jesus, just hold on. I’m coming for you, bro.” Garrett scrambled forward on waterlogged limbs. Smaller twigs cracked and snapped, breaking beneath him as he reached for David’s hands. “I got you!”

  “I thought I was a goner!” David wept. Then without warning, something crashed into the brush pile.

  Garrett was knocked off balance, lost his footing, and plunged through the pile.

  David slipped from his grip as both boys were cast back into the river.

  Garrett flailed his arms, fighting with all his strength to swim against the current, but it was like trying to win a tug-of-war contest with a locomotive. He had nothing left. He had already dug down deep all the way to the bottom, and the cramp in his left leg came back with vengeance, completely locking it up.

  A thought occurred to him then, and for whatever reason it struck him as funny. It wasn’t going to be giants, dragons, or elf wizards that killed him. It wasn’t going to be giant rats, the God Stones, or Lincoln’s booby traps. It wasn’t going to be any of the things his parents didn’t warn him about. No, it was going to be the one thing his parents had always warned him about. His whole life, it was the one thing they said to stay away from – the goddamn Sangamon River. Now that was irony. Garrett laughed. Actually laughed. He swallowed about a half-gallon of rancid river water as he did, but what did that matter? He laughed so damn hard he must have lost his mind.

  On the dam Lenny heard the shouting, but he strained to see upriver. His headlamp couldn’t penetrate farther than directly in front of him, so he ripped it off and squinted into the night, hoping to see something – anything. Then a strange thing happened. The night changed and it wasn’t night anymore. It wasn’t daytime either, but it was suddenly somehow different. The night had turned into a bizarre twilight. The moonlight was radiant, with an electric shimmer, but even brighter – a supercharged moonlight. But there was no moon nor stars on this night, only silver rain, lightning, and storm clouds thick as dirt.

  Was this what Janis saw when she looked into the dark? As Lenny’s eyes adjusted, he began to see movement fighting against the current just upriver.

  In his most optimistic of hopes he had prayed that Garrett would cross close enough to his side that he could reach his staff out at just the right moment and Garrett would grab on before being washed over, but now his heart sank. He was still above the water, but he was floating facedown and about to be pulled over the dam on the far side of the break, a good thirty yards away and nowhere near Lenny.

  “I’m going!” Lenny said to no one. Then as loud as he could yell, “I’m coming, Garrett!”

  As water crashed over rocks that refused to breach the surface, the Sangamon roared a never-ending warning, loud enough to rival that of a dragon about to breathe fire.

  Stay away or die!

  To do what Lenny was about to do was suicide.

  Lenny took three steps back, then positioned his right leg behind him as he fixed his eyes upstream. Bouncing on his toes twice, he flexed his fingers around his staff.

  Goddammit, Lennard Wade, what are you doing?! “Going to get my friend!” he screamed as he took off running straight for the breach.

  Lenny jumped.

  He soared several feet out over the broken dam, over the fast current and jagged rocks. Then he dropped like a stone before reaching a dozen feet. As he leapt into the gauntlet of jagged rocks, the laws of gravity would only allow for one outcome. When his feet made contact with the water, they were sure to be ripped out from under him by millions of gallons of angry river. The stone teeth of the broken dam would chew him up like a hungry shark, and finally, he would be swallowed by the undertow and consumed into the bowels of the Sangamon.

  Garrett drew in too much water; it choked him, sucking what little strength he had left out
of his limbs. He was drowning. His face was under water, and he couldn’t even fight it. In a final effort to breathe, he pushed his face above the water line one last time. Lightning flashed and in the corner of his vision he saw something so ridiculous it couldn’t be real. A glimpse of a scene so absurd it had to be a hallucination brought on by lack of oxygen to his brain. But there it was – several yards in the distance David clung to a giant rat’s tail as it pulled him through the water. But stranger still, the rat was being ridden by Paul.

  The burst of lightning switched off, leaving Garrett surrounded by darkness once again. All around him the great serpent tugged, unwilling to let go.

  Garrett slipped quietly under the black water and died.

  44

  Pressing On

  Wednesday, April 6 – God Stones Day 1

  Rural Chiapas State, Mexico

  Once Sarah and Gabi had rested for a few minutes, they waded across what turned out to be a small, shallow stream and pulled themselves from the water.

  Gabi looked back from the direction they had come, her voice barely a mutter. “We’re off the mountain.” She looked at the moon again. “We must be on the back side of it now.”

  Sarah followed her gaze. “We could be miles away from base camp, but once we get out of this gorge, we should be able to get our bearings and get back. We need to get help. Juan and his crew will still be there trying to figure out what happened. Maybe they have already called for help.”

  As they hiked through the dense foliage around the mountain, neither spoke. Gabi staggered along, lost in thoughts of her mother and father, periodically collapsing into a heap of tears. Sarah never pressed her or rushed her. Instead, each time she lost it, Sarah lost it with her, and together they cried. And each time they picked themselves up after a moment and pressed on.

  Hours passed as night turned to morning and the sun rose, casting its harsh rays on their already fire-seared backs. As the heat began to press, Gabi’s thoughts drifted to what they had seen, and she couldn’t help but wonder how they were going to explain all this to anyone who hadn’t been there to see it. No one would believe it. When the authorities came to investigate would the dragon still be inside, and if so would they be killed too? Soon her question was answered for her. The dragon would not be below, waiting for whoever came.

  Overhead, a loud shriek rang out across the mountain. It was terrible and angry and could only belong to one thing – the murderer of her parents.

  Gabi winced, throwing her hands over her ears and herself onto the ground. Beside her Sarah did the same.

  Above them a large shadow appeared, momentarily blotting out the sun. The dragon flew over them, flapping its massive wings and belting out a torrent of fire as it disappeared into the midmorning sun. In the distant southwest, the forest combusted in unnatural colors. Acres upon acres ignited in flame so quickly it was as if the sun had lunged forward and kissed the mountains with one single fiery caress. They felt the heat right away, but the flames were nowhere near them.

  “It didn’t see us,” Gabi said hopefully, but beneath her relief she felt a surprising rage building inside her.

  “Come on, Gabi, we have to be close.”

  They turned away from the dragon as it continued southwest, deep into the Sierra Madre de Chiapas mountains, screaming and breathing fire.

  Finally, they made it back around the mouth of the gorge leading to the entry point of the site, but base camp was deserted.

  “Everyone is gone!” Gabi said.

  “No, they wouldn’t have left us unless they went for help, but the vehicles are still here,” Sarah said. “First things first.” Sarah retrieved two bottles of water from the supply. “We need to hydrate. Juan and his team must be inside trying to get us out.” Sarah took a pull of water and nodded toward the trail leading into the gorge. “I will go tell them we are here. You can wait here and get some food in you. You must be starving.”

  “Sarah, don’t leave me. I will go with you,” Gabi said, her eyes tearing up. She did not want to be left alone but more than that they still didn’t know what happened to the giant.

  “Okay, come on,” Sarah said, her eyes softening. “I won’t leave you, Gabi. I won’t ever leave you.”

  Gabi nodded.

  As they approached the crevice Gabi’s stomach twisted. The whole thing was sealed with rubble. It had collapsed again.

  Sarah dropped to her knees. “Jesus, they were all inside. They must have been.”

  “Maybe they are still alive! Maybe it’s only the opening that collapsed!” Gabi said, hope filling her voice.

  Sarah nodded, forcing a smile. “Come on, let’s get back to the vehicles and call for help.”

  Once back at camp, Gabi jumped into one of the three Jeeps and turned the key… nothing. “It’s completely dead!”

  Sarah tried one of the others. “Dammit! This one won’t start either! Gabi, try the satellite phone! It should be in the back!” she shouted as she ran toward the equipment truck.

  Gabi pulled the satellite phone from the backseat. It was dead too. “No, no, no! This can’t be!” She continued desperately pressing buttons to no avail. “It isn’t working, Sarah!” From the truck she heard Sarah scream out in frustration. She climbed out of the Jeep and stood facing Sarah, the satellite phone hanging loose in one hand. “What do we do?”

  Sarah wiped her sleeve across her brow. “All the vehicles are dead and the phone too. What the hell is going on!?” It was nearing noon and already getting incredibly warm under the hot Mexico sun. “With no power to start the vehicles, the CB radios won’t work even if someone was within range to hear them. Without Fredy or your dad, I don’t think I can get us back.”

  Gabi pointed toward the jungle in a northerly direction. “I know the way back, but it would be a long hike before we reach help.”

  Sarah’s eyes followed the pointing finger. “We need to rest and eat first. We should try and sleep some too.”

  Gabi had no appetite to eat and knew she would not sleep but agreed anyway. She knew she had to at least try to eat and rest if they were going to get out of there.

  They thought of starting a fire but neither had the energy. So they sat, leaning against one of the Jeeps, and force fed themselves cold canned beans and rations.

  Smoke billowed in the distance as Gabi finished off the last of her freeze-dried scrambled egg rations. “Sarah, do you think we are safe to stay and rest? What if the fire works itself this way?”

  “I don’t think it will. The wind seems to be carrying it in the opposite direction. I can’t even smell the smoke now,” Sarah said. Then, brightening a little, she turned to face the girl. “But maybe it will draw authorities to fight the fire and we can get help.”

  Gabi nodded.

  “But first we rest,” Sarah said, glancing toward the camp tents, an unease spreading across her face.

  Gabi followed her gaze. There was no way she would be able to close her eyes with nothing more than a zipper separating her from only María Purísima knew what.

  “We’ll rest in the Jeep. Come on.”

  They climbed into the cab of the Jeep covered by the most shade and locked the doors. Gabi was sure she wouldn’t sleep but as soon as she leaned back and closed her eyes, she slipped into a fitful nightmare of fire-breathing dragons and her parents’ screams.

  Sometime later Gabi woke with a start. The entire Jeep had jolted, tossing her to the opposite seat. “What!” Her eyes went wide as she struggled to orient herself. Where am I? Then the horror of the earlier events came rushing back. Four shots rang out in fast succession. Gabi threw herself down, scrambling off the seat and onto the floorboard. “Oh! María Purísima! What’s happening?” She screamed for Sarah, but Sarah was gone. She was alone in the Jeep. She pushed on the driver’s side door handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. Crawling to the other side, she pushed open the door and fell out onto the dirt. “Sarah! Where are you? Sarah!” There was a loud crash of smashing metal a
s the Jeep jolted again, tipping up onto two wheels, threatening to tip over, crushing her, but it slowly lurched back the other way, settling onto all four tires again.

  She still couldn’t see what was happening. More gun shots. She screamed again and pressed herself against the nearest tire. Were they being shot at? Who was shooting at them? Gabi’s mind raced for a logical answer. It could be the cartel, she thought.

  More gunfire.

  More shouting. Gabi’s English was good, but the words Sarah was screaming weren’t familiar.

  A large boulder rolled passed the front of the Jeep, crashing into the jungle behind her. Sarah! Suddenly hiding behind the Jeep didn’t seem like such a good idea. If that boulder had hit the Jeep, it might have flipped it right on top of her. Gabi pushed herself into a squat and peeked carefully over the hood. Her mouth fell open.

  The giant was midway up the mountain, standing on a newly cleared flat section. He was pulling large chunks of rock from behind him and tossing them idly down the mountain. The base camp was right in the line of fire. Gabi caught movement to her right and quickly found the source of the gunshots. Sarah was reloading an assault rifle, which must have been in one of the Jeeps. Another boulder came dangerously close. It was only a matter of time before her luck ran out.

  Gabi ran from behind the Jeep, dodging a smaller boulder as it bounded by. “Sarah! What are you doing?”

  “Get in the truck, Gabi!” she shouted, pointing the rifle up the mountain, the stock tight against her shoulder as she squinted one eye closed and squeezed the trigger repetitively. A burst of rapid cracks echoed off the mountains. “Yes! I hit him! Gabi, I got him!”