The Crucible: A Lawson Vampire Novel (The Lawson Vampire Series)

by Jon F. Merz

  He nodded. “Think about it. You’d need an axe to go chop firewood, right? And when you walk with an axe, where is it?”

  “In your hand?”

  Jack smiled. “Over your shoulder. So the face of the axe faces home when you’re walking away from it. And when you come back from the forest, the face is still pointed toward the forest.”

  I smiled. “I think you might have something.”

  Jack moved to the door and looked at me. “Which one?”

  I pointed. “That axe right there.”

  “Then here goes nothing,” said Jack.

  4

  I watched as the word for axe slowly slid into the stone door. For a moment, nothing happened again and I glanced around, frankly expecting that the entire cave might fall in upon us. But then I heard a grinding sound and the door before us slid back and then opened to the side. A rush of musty air blasted us in the face.

  Jack wrinkled his nose. “Lovely.”

  “I’m guessing we might be the first ones in here in a long time.”

  “How long?” asked Jack.

  I shrugged. “Don’t know, but we won’t get anything done just standing here. You want point ?”

  Jack eyed the interior of what I hoped was the temple itself. Then he stood back. “Maybe you should take this.”

  I nodded. “Fair enough. Stay close.” I eased through the door, marveling at the runners the stone door had been positioned on. They’d been carved into the mountain itself and even the wheels that enabled the door to move were made of stone. I guessed they had to be marble or something else extremely hard that could take the weight of the door.

  Ahead of us, the tunnel gradually curved and led us into a small room. There were three options branching off from here, each of them bathed in darkness. I glanced at Jack. “Any preference?”

  “Do we have a choice? We’ve got to take one of them. If it’s not the right path, we’ll just have to come back and try the other one.”

  That sounded fine, but my stomach tensed a bit when Jack said that. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go charging down one of these tunnels on the assumption I could just come back. I shook my head. “No, that can’t be it. It wouldn’t be this easy. Not after what we just came through.”

  “You mean the riddle?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So you think this is another test?”

  I glanced around the room, but there was nothing else aside from the tunnel entrances. “It’s too easy. Figure if you got through the door and were all happy about doing so, you’d come in here, pause and then assume you’d gotten through the tough part. But I don’t think this place is going to give up its secrets - or the Cloak, for that matter - without making sure we really want it.”

  “So what do we do?”

  I got down on my hands and knees and approached the first tunnel entrance on our left. At the ground level, I could see a bit better and ran my eyes over every inch, working my way up the entrance until I reached the ceiling. Then I came back down on the other side.

  There.

  The hole was small, barely the width of my pinky finger. But it was positioned at about level with my throat. I checked the other side again and found another hole slightly lower, on level with my chest. I called over my shoulder to Jack. “See if you can find a stick or a stone I can use, will you?”

  “How big?”

  “About the size of my fist, or a stick is fine. Whatever you can find.”

  Jack vanished back out into the main tunnel. Meanwhile, I crawled over to the middle tunnel and repeated my scan. This tunnel had a hole in the ceiling and in the cave floor.

  “How’s this?”

  I looked back and saw Jack had a thick branch in his hand. “Where’d you get that?”

  “I crawled back up and broke it off the trees around the tunnel entrance.”

  “You were able to climb back up?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve been doing some mountaineering stuff. It wasn’t too hard, just a matter of bracing myself properly.”

  I took the stick. “All right, let’s check this out.” I broke the branch about a third of the way down and then stood back with Jack. “Watch.”

  I flung the piece of the branch at the left tunnel entrance. As the branch flew through the opening, we heard a hissing sound and then two small darts flew out and bounced off the walls where we would have been if we’d taken that route. I walked over and carefully picked up one of them. A sticky substance dripped off the end of it. I sniffed and recoiled instantly.

  “What is it?”

  I threw the dart down. “Pine sap mixed with something else. I’m guessing if that got into our bloodstream, we’d be goners.”

  Jack frowned. “Wait-so this is a vampire temple?”

  “Seems to be. I don’t know why else they’d have stuff here that could take us down.”

  “Unless it’s equally poisonous to humans.”

  I nodded. “Good point. Let’s try tunnel two.” I broke the branch again, this time in half.

  The effect was the same. Two more darts flew out and then clattered away across the floor. I had one piece of the branch left.

  Jack grinned. “Third time’s the charm?”

  “Hopefully. We don’t have any other choices here.” I threw the branch.

  Nothing.

  I exhaled. “Okay, I guess that’s as good an indicator as any.”

  “I’d prefer a sign that says this is the way you want to go.”

  “Yeah, well, the chances of that happening are pretty slim.” I took a breath. “Let’s go.” We walked through the opening and I braced myself, but nothing happened. I heard Jack exhale behind me. He was as relieved as I was. We walked for what seemed about a hundred yards and then I sensed something different in the air. It grew warmer.

  Jack sniffed once and then cleared his throat. “Lawson.”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’re not alone here.”

  “Good or bad?” I guessed that the temperature change meant that there were vampire spirits around us. Given that the traps were capable of killing a vampire, it seemed fairly certain that the Cloak was resting within an old vampire temple. I’d wrongly assumed this would be something human monks might have established.

  Jack hadn’t said anything, so I looked over my shoulder. His eyes were closed and he seemed to be in some sort of trance. To be honest, the stuff he did sort of freaked me out. I had no idea what he was truly capable of, but over the last year or so, he’d demonstrated any number of skills that left me convinced Jack was one of most powerful folks in my life. I was just glad he was on my side.

  I gave him another minute and then he finally opened his eyes again and smiled. “It’s all good.”

  “It is?”

  He nodded. “Yeah. We’re going to walk another fifty yards and then the tunnel will be blocked again.”

  I glanced back at the tunnel. “Okay.”

  Sure enough, fifty yards further on, we came up against a solid wall that reminded me of the entrance to the temple. Minus the writing. I sighed. “Great. Now what?”

  Jack pushed past me. “Relax, leave it to me.”

  I watched him put two hands on the wall and then shove.

  The wall slid in and then back. Jack smiled. “Not bad, huh?”

  “A lot easier than the last time. How’d you do that?”

  “Turns out the spirit was fairly friendly. I just explained that we meant no harm or disrespect and once we got what we had come here for, we’d be on our way. That seemed to satisfy him and he told me about the door here.”

  “Can he tell us anything else?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like where the Cloak is?”

  Jack closed his eyes again and a few seconds later he opened them. “He’s gone.”

  “Is that unusual?”He shrugged. “Nah, spirits have stuff to do on their plane that we wouldn’t understand. He might have just taken off or something.”

  Personally, that
didn’t make me feel all that warm and fuzzy. And I was wary of trusting anything a spirit told us. Not because I had anything against them, per se, but I just find it easier to trust people I can come back and kill if they’ve betrayed me.

  And I couldn’t kill a spirit. At least, not that I knew of. Jack probably could, but I doubted it was something he could teach me in a weekend seminar.

  “So, where now?”

  Jack pointed. “Seems natural that we proceed in this direction. Especially since it looks a bit lighter up ahead.”

  He was right. As we walked, the darkness faded and I started to wonder if we’d finally entered the inner portion of the temple itself. If so, there was a good chance we’d be able to grab the Cloak and be on our way. At least, that’s what I hoped.

  The tunnel curved again and then we came around and out into a large room that reminded me of an amphitheater. The room looked like it had been scooped out of solid rock and in the center, a small fire burned in a brazier. But what was interesting was the color of the flames. They were blue.

  I pointed at the fire. “Can you explain that one?”

  Jack smirked. “Seems obvious that there are a lot of spirits here. Sometimes their residual energy changes things like that. You’ll notice it’s warm here despite that fire being very small.”

  He was right again. I wasn’t sweating yet, but the temperature had definitely risen since we’d come deeper into the temple. “You sure those are spirits?”

  “Oh yeah. They’re pretty active here.”

  “Is your new friend among them or is he still gone?”

  Jack was quiet for a moment and then frowned. “Nah, still gone. But one of the new ones is pretty talkative. Give me a minute.” He closed his eyes again and I felt alone. He was still there, but he wasn’t on this plane so much as he was off in the spirit realm. I reflected on how much easier my life was knowing the security of a simple gun. Even with all the scumbags I’d dealt with, I still thought it was better than dealing with ghosts and other supernatural stuff. But Jack had been born into that tradition and it seemed to suit him just fine.

  I stood there, trying not to make any noise that might have disturbed Jack. I concentrated on the fire in the brazier and marveled at the depth of colors flickering within. It ran from a very pale blue to a deep shade of cobalt. Over and over again. I found myself breathing in time to the color changes, fascinated at the patterns and rhythms of it. And I found it tough to pull my eyes away from it.

  It was damned near hypnotic.

  “Lawson.”

  I blinked, took a breath, and then shook my head. “Wow.”

  “You okay?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, that fire is pretty mesmerizing, though.”

  “As well it should be. It’s another trap.”

  “You’re joking.”

  “I wish I was. But I think this is the last part of it.”

  “Last part of it? What are you talking about?”

  Jack looked uncomfortable. “We’ve got a bit a problem. The spirits aren’t exactly thrilled with us being here.”

  “I thought you said the other spirit was fine with it.”

  Jack shrugged. “Yeah, well, that might have been okay with him, but these new folks aren’t too keen on us being in their presence.”

  “You try explaining to them like how you did with the other guy?”

  “Yup.”

  “No go?”

  “Nope. They told me they don’t care. We can either back up and leave, go back the way we came. Or we can risk their wrath.”

  “I didn’t hear a third option in there, that being we grab the Cloak and bug out.”

  “That’s because they don’t want the Cloak to leave with us.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  I took a breath. “Any suggestions? This is much more your area of expertise than mine.”

  Jack grinned in spite of his discomfort. “Well, yeah. I think we’re going to have to fight them for it.”

  5

  Fighting spirits wasn’t something I was particularly keen on doing. Especially since it’s not exactly my forte. Put a bad vampire in front of me and I have no problem plugging his chest full of lots and lots of wood. But ghosts? I’d rather leave that to the professionals. Like Jack.

  “So, how are you going to handle this?”

  Jack frowned. “I wish it was that easy.”

  “It’s not?”

  He shook his head. “Because I’m the intermediary, I can’t get involved.”

  “That sounds like a cop-out. You’re the Invoker. This is what you’ve been trained to handle. I’m just the grunt here. You know, the guy with the gun?”

  Jack smiled. “I know, but the spirits won’t accept my involvement. It has to be you that agrees to battle them. Only then if you win can we proceed and grab the Cloak.”

  I sighed. I hadn’t envisioned battling ghosts when I’d planed this trip. Even as haphazardly as I’d thrown this together, I hadn’t figured on supernatural entities wanting to throw down with me.

  “So what do I have to do?”

  Jack closed his eyes for a moment and then when he reopened them, he didn’t look all that happy. “It’s a battle of willpower.”

  “What - like not having dessert with dinner?”

  “Not even close.” Jack pointed. “You see the color of the fire there?”

  “The cobalt one?”

  “Uh huh. The lead spirit here is going to change the color to a bright red.”

  “Okay.”

  “You have to keep him from doing that.”

  I eyed Jack. “Right. So exactly how am I supposed to do that?”

  Jack took a breath. “By using your mind.”

  I shook my head. “Not exactly fair. Or possible, some would probably argue.”

  “No doubt,” said Jack.

  “You didn’t have to agree. Sheesh.”

  Jack waved his hand. “Forget it, would you? You’ve got bigger things to deal with here. The task is not going to be easy. And no, that’s not an insult.”

  “You sure?”

  He ignored me. “You’ve got to sit down in front of the fire and concentrate on making sure the spirit isn’t able to change the fire to red. If he does, then we’re screwed.”

  “How screwed?”

  “Bare minimum? No Cloak.”

  The temperature in the cavern grew warmer. “And if it’s worse?”

  “They’ll kill us.”

  “Awesome.” I glanced around and sighed. The cobalt flame continued to flicker and dance, casting light and shadows across the walls. I walked closer with Jack behind me. “Just sit here, huh?”

  “I recommend closing your eyes and thinking only about the color you see right now. Grab that image and hold it in your mind. Don’t let anything else distract you. Because the spirit will surely try to confuse you and get you thinking about something else. That’s when it will win.”

  “No prob,” I said tapping the side of my head. “This thing is like a steel trap. Once it’s in, it’s not getting back out.”

  “Famous last words,” muttered Jack.

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “Don’t underestimate these guys, Lawson. They’ve been cooped up for centuries. They’ve had all the time in the universe to practice this art. You, on the other hand, have just spent the last thirty-six hours crisscrossing the globe - illegally, I might add - in search of an item which may or may not help rescue your girlfriend - also highly illegal.”

  “Well, when you put it like that…”

  “Exactly,” said Jack. “So I suggest you try to flush all the stress and extraneous thoughts from your head and treat this seriously.” He pointed at a rock near where the cobalt flame danced. “You’ll need to sit there.”

  I walked over and seated myself. For a rock, it was remarkably smooth and didn’t hurt my butt much when I sat down. That was good; there’s nothing worse than an uncomfortable chair. I
looked at Jack. “Where does the spirit sit?”

  “It doesn’t need to sit, but if it makes you feel better, you might think of it as hovering on the other side of the flame.”

  I placed my hands on my lap and took several deep breaths. The flame before me was hypnotic. Tendrils of flame rose and fell with no discernible pattern. I couldn’t even fathom what the source of the fire was. It simply resided in a small stone bowl and kept burning. I couldn’t smell it. “This fire isn’t natural, is it?”

  “Obviously,” said Jack. “But don’t worry: the spirit will not cheat. You can be assured of that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because the other spirits here will not permit it. If you are able to win this, then you will have won their respect. We’ll be permitted to continue on with the quest.”

  I kept my eyes on the flame. My breathing had slowed even further. “How long do I have to keep the fire this way?”

  “Five minutes.”

  That didn’t sound too long, but I knew better. Counting to three hundred could take some time, especially when there was the spirit of a deceased vampire trying to use its willpower to win a contest. But we didn’t have any choice. And Jack wasn’t able to do this. I felt like a contestant on a reality game show and it was my time to step up to the next challenge.

  “I’m ready.”

  Jack placed a hand on my back. “Good luck.”

  He stepped back and then I heard his voice chant something. The air in the cavern jolted and I felt the heat come down. I guessed it was already time to work so I focused on the cobalt flame and then closed my eyes. Slowing my breathing always helped me whenever I’d meditated in the past. I wasn’t a daily meditator - too many people get far too deep into all sorts of New Agey silliness and then completely lose their grasp on reality - but I appreciated what it had done for me in the past during times of stress. I just hoped it wouldn’t let me down this time.

  The image in my head danced exactly like the fire before me. But I wasn’t watching that fire. I simply kept that image as cobalt blue as I could. Anytime any sort of color drained away or changed, I took a breath and brought the image back to the color I needed it to remain. I could feel sweat starting to break out along my hairline. It dripped down my face and pooled along the neckline of my shirt. My breathing increased now as I felt the full pressure of the spirit’s willpower.