“No don’t! There could be some foul curse attached to it!” Ronan whispered harshly looking very pale.
Talaric looked up and tapped his chest, “Remember that He who is inside of you is greater. No curse or evil spell can ever overwhelm Him. We are in no danger and if we are we already know our destination anyway so what’s to worry about?”
“Surviving to see tomorrow!” Muttered Ronan under his breath, as Talaric pulled the faded fabric back to expose the glowing object.
It was in the shape of a triangle and was mounted on a necklace. It glowed blue and it constantly shimmered. Its surface rippled like oil in water.
Talaric broke the glowing triangle free from the necklace cord and straightened back up with it in hand. It felt warm in his hand and as he straightened with it the room came alive with color, as the painted artwork and murals lit up around the room.
There were scrolls all around the small room, no doubt the most treasured keepsakes of the long dead queen. Any museum would have given all that they had to display what was stacked up in little piles of glittering intricacy and beauty, but all Talaric was reminded of was the age-old precept, ‘you can’t take it with you’.
Having light to work by both men quickly looked through the scrolls, which were remarkably well preserved. Talaric could only understand parts of what he read, but he got the understanding that this place had been built after the great flood, but close to it in proximity of time frame.
The self-styled queen had found the amulet that he now had and had gained insight from it. Using it she had become a powerful ruler over a small kingdom. She had been born some two hundred years after the great flood, but had lived almost six hundred years.
There had been a rebellion in her kingdom and she had been attacked by other kingdoms and that was where the account ended. Talaric looked around in frustration, all very useful to know the history of this place, but that didn’t help him with his problem.
There was too much here to go through and so little time.
Less time than he knew. The glow of the room was radiating out of the blue sapphire faceted eyes of the figurehead casting a thousand pinpricks of blue light out upon the cavern at large.
Even the coldhearted killers, who had invaded this underground sanctum dedicated in commemoration to the lusts of the past, felt a moment of fear. It appeared as if the giant queen had awakened at the ransacking of her estate and intended to repay the trespassers dearly for their transgression.
After their momentary panic of fear faded and their discipline took back over orders were screamed out to find the source of the light.
Talaric looked up from the pile of scrolls he was rifling through at the sound of pounding on the walls of the alcove and hallway. They had found them, but how?
His eyes drifted to the oval orbs of the giant statue and he knew how.
“The light! The light has betrayed us! I told you there was a curse on it, but you wouldn’t listen to me!” Ronan accused angrily.
“Get a grip on yourself man and look for another way out!” Talaric snapped, as he continued to look for what he needed, even as the thumps on the walls got more concerted.
Cracks began to appear, even as plaster dust wafted down to cloud heavily into the air.
“I found a way!” Ronan screamed excitedly pointing at the opposite side of the alcove away from the glistening eyes.
A spiral staircase they had overlooked led upward.
“Good! Now help me!” But Ronan was already climbing the stairs.
Talaric glanced down the hallway and saw a block of stone shoved out of the wall. Light spilled into the dim hallway. It would be only a matter of seconds before they had a hole large enough to crawl through and invade the space.
The scrolls he was rifling through contained all matters of interesting past historical information, but none of it was seemingly relevant to what he needed to know. He couldn’t decipher most of it anyway.
He could be holding the very scroll that he needed right now and not know it. He needed more time!
But he had none.
Another block fell out of the wall beside the first one. He had to go; he made his way toward the stairs. His feet were on the first stair tread, when he saw something from across the room from where he had been searching through scrolls.
It was an old weathered box that was badly decayed and had parts of it missing. On the box was a symbol that was almost worn away and barely discernible, but he recognized it.
How could he not after all it was his own family’s coat of arms. Parts of the Ta’lont crest were gone, but enough remained to verify it for what it was.
Jumping from the stairway Talaric lunged for the box and pulled his pack off as he did. He dumped everything out of his pack only taking the time to shove his big pistols into the waistband of his pants. He then shoved the entire box, which was surprisingly heavy into the pack and slung the pack back over his shoulder and made for the stairs.
There was a crash as a whole section of wall fell and soon after bullets began to ping off the spiral stairway that Talaric hurtled upward. Reaching a dark loft area Talaric yelled for Ronan, but heard nothing.
He ran down a narrow hallway that lit up as he ran down it. They were more stairs at the end of it and he vaulted up them. No one had come this way in a very long time. Dust rose with each step and he could only see evidence of Ronan’s tracks in the dust.
Abruptly the hall ended at a pair of double doors that were elaborately engraved with what else but naked women and snakes.
The old queen could have done better with her pick of an interior and exterior designer. Ronan was there at the doors already and Talaric avoided looking at him afraid that his temper would explode at the man for abandoning him like he had. He had already decided that Ronan was off the team and free to make his own way in the world.
Ronan didn’t meet his eyes either as he said, “The doors they will not budge. I think you have to place the amulet here.” He said pointing to a place in the center of one of the doors that had a triangular cavity, which had lines radiating out from it into the rest of the doors artwork.
Talaric took the triangular amulet out of his pocket and placed it in the hole that seemed designed for it. The artwork of the door lit up and there was a click. Talaric pulled on the handle that was shaped in the figure of a cobra head.
The doors swung open to reveal a large room. This must have been the queen’s private chambers. Gold and gems gleamed everywhere in great supply, but that wasn’t all that was in the room.
At a loss for words Talaric breathed out, “Oh dear God have mercy!”
While Ronan’s face went completely slack with dread, “We’re in hell!” He whimpered.
The room was as ornately done up as any palace chamber ever had been, but it was completely crawling with snakes.
A cobra near Ronan’s feet abruptly reared up and made to strike. Talaric quickly grabbed Ronan and pulled him out of the way, but as soon as he touched Ronan the snake relaxed.
He let go for a moment and the cobra rose back up threateningly, but then relaxed back to the floor when Talaric touched Ronan’s hand again.
A bead of sweat ran down Talaric’s face as he grabbed a hold of Ronan’s hand, “Whatever you do don’t let go of my hand!”
“What?” Ronan quivered out unbelievingly, as he watched Talaric step forward bringing him along with him.
It was hard to find a bare spot on the white marble floor inlaid with gold and gemstones. Each step came with an almost unavoidable occurrence of stepping on a snake.
They were everywhere!
This truly was a nightmare.
The meaning of nightmare was redefined, as Talaric felt a snake coil up his leg. Talaric very gently reached out and grasped the sand viper by the head and pulled it free of him.
It made no attempt to strike at him, as he dropped it back to the floor. It had to be the energy being given off by the amulet that was calming the snakes.
Sweat dribbled off of Talaric, as he made his way across the floor toward an open door on the other side of it. He had to almost wade through in places and quite a few times he stepped on snakes, but not one of them retaliated back. Ronan was losing it though.
A big python came up over his back and loosely coiled around the front of his neck. Screaming insanely he tore his hand free from Talaric’s to grasp at the thick snake coil about his throat.
He was struck at least a hundred times in less than ten seconds. Ronan was dead from the sheer volume of venom before he collapsed onto the floor. Talaric grimly picked up Ronan’s pack and kept making his way to the door, pulling off wayward snakes as he went and dropping them back to the floor.
It took everything he had to walk and not run. He made it to the doorway and was relieved to see the hall beyond free of snakes. He checked to make sure that he didn’t have any still clinging to him or in his packs.
Satisfied that he was snakeless he opened Ronan’s backpack up and dug out a big piece of plastic explosive and stuck a detonator in it. He then pushed the plastic overtop of the blue glowing amulet, which he then tossed into the center of the room.
Figures appeared at the other side of the room and despite their tough demeanors Talaric heard a few shocked shrieks of terror. They hadn’t seen him and he disappeared down the dark hallway tossing plastic explosives as he went. The descending hallway curved around and down to the first floor level where Talaric stepped through a shimmering wall into a room that had already been gutted of its treasures.
He walked straight into the main floor of the temple. Everyone was either too distracted by what was happening on the second and third floors or too busy in their work of boxing stuff up to notice him as he walked right through their midst.
He made his way down the stairs and slapped more C4 to both of the main pillars and the legs of the statue. He then tossed the bag back inside the temple with whatever was left inside of it and then walked through the jumbled boxes and unseeing people, calmly as if he belonged as a member of the hectic scene.
A guard noticed he was different though and made to stop him and Talaric lifted a pistol and drilled him between the eyes and his companion who had started to raise a submachine gun.
Everyone’s eyes raised up to regard Talaric and before they grabbed for their weapons Talaric hit the button on the remote he held in one hand. All the C4 went off at once. That would’ve been enough to destroy the temple and its contents, but the blue amulets power source made the explosion almost seismically larger.
The temple was literally blown apart and it and the cavern beyond were consumed in a searing blue flame of unmatched intensity. Talaric had misjudged the magnitude of the blast and his error almost killed him. Diving around a corner he narrowly missed being caught by the consuming blue fire.
Gaining his feet he ran. He ran like never before up through the levels of bygone history. The ground shook under and around him, as if gripped in the mighty throes of an earthquake.
The quaking was the ground settling, as ancient void spaces collapsed down on themselves, their supports unseated by the force of the explosion in the deepest cavern.
The row of weakly glowing lights flickered and went out and then came back on. Talaric ran with a will driven by the need to survive. His lungs threatened to explode as he ducked under toppling pillars that dated back to before the Romans. The lights went out, but Talaric could see light up ahead and drew both pistols. He busted out into the light as the tunnel collapsed behind him in a cloud of dust and debris.
There had to be over twenty helicopters parked close together in the market square beyond. There were no shortage of men with guns either. The small army looked confused as to what was taking place and Talaric didn’t let them think on it any. Continuing to run all out, he brought up both pistols and held them pointed to either side of him and pulled the triggers not bothering to aim.
Bullets began to kick up dust all around him and he felt one graze across his cheek.
Suddenly in the midst of the stressed chaos of the scene a cool voice intoned its way into his head, “The last lady on the right Captain! You’ll know me by my colors.”
With the adrenalized beat of his own heart loud in his ears and the percussion sound of his pistols and of the other weapons going off Talaric made out very little of it, ‘….lady in…line? …..Colors?’
Then he saw and knew that somehow Eleanor had figured out where they would pop out and had even gone so far as to arrange for transportation.
The last sleek black helicopter in the lineup had a pink T-shirt wrapped conspicuously around one of the landing struts. It was already fired up and lifting off the ground throwing up a maelstrom of dust and debris that peppered off the ancient cobblestones of the marketplace floor.
Eleanor brought the helicopter broadways of Talaric’s route and he leaped up into the open bay. Not bothering to catch his breath he swung around and grabbed a hold of the rail gun and swung it up and began to unload it into the twenty plus gunmen, who had been chasing after him and were now spraying the helicopter with bullets.
Eleanor lifted up abruptly away from the marketplace, even as Talaric swung the rail gun to directly take aim at a large troop helicopter that was in the midst of several others.
It exploded into a large fireball of flame and set off a chain reaction of explosions across all the remaining helicopters.
They were just clear enough of the marketplace to avoid the castoff flames and shrapnel caused from the explosions. Talaric leaned back against his seat and took the time to catch his breath in big gulps of air after just having had the run of his life.
Dimly he heard Eleanor’s voice drift back to him from the forward cockpit, “Just be the one passenger then, Sir?”
He nodded and she turned back around in her seat and was quiet for a moment, until she interrupted the silence, “Sir it would appear that there’s a jet assigned to these duckies!”
Moments later tracer fire splintered through the space where the helicopter had just been. Eleanor was flying evasively and to have to experience the flips and jolts of her maneuvering was enough to almost wish for a missile and an end to the misery.
Above it all and as calm as a pond on a hot July night, Eleanor squeezed out from between the front seats and into the rear bay, “I never liked ducks and I feel too much like one at the moment for my taste!”
She tossed a parachute pack at Talaric.
He swung the pack off his back and slipped into the parachute harness. Glancing up he saw her still standing there, “Isn’t there another chute?” He exploded in question.
“Afraid not Sir going to be a bit of a piggyback affair of sorts, hope your intended doesn’t mind the togetherness.”
She quickly turned and pressed up against him and snapped her flight harness to his chute harness. Talaric stepped forward, as Eleanor reached out and snatched an oblong weathered case out from underneath a bench seat.
They both went tumbling into space head over heels out the side door of the helicopter flying onward in auto pilot mode. They didn’t have much ground clearance so Talaric pulled the chute as soon as they were free of the chopper.
Seconds later, as the chute caught open they saw the trail of the missile and the resulting explosion of the chopper. A fireball of blown apart wreckage and flame fell from the sky.
A fighter jet shot by them moments later, its sonic boom loud in the desert air. They watched it bank around and they both knew then that it had seen the chute and that it was coming back to finish them off. Eleanor wriggled in the restrictive harness and brought up the heavy looking oblong case and snapped it open.
“I had so much time on my hands this morning Sir that I couldn’t resist the opportunity to do a little shopping, hope you don’t mind given the serious venture we’ve embarked on.”
Of all things she pulled out a portable missile launcher!
Talaric just shook his head in disbelief at her reso
urcefulness, “Is that thing loaded?”
“It had better well bloody be! I paid enough for it from that slinky one eyed son of a sea serpent for it to be!” She said as she brought it upward to her shoulder.
Talaric still couldn’t believe it, “And he just gave it to you? What did you tell them you were going to do with it?”
“Duck hunting. I hate the quaky little creatures don’t you know. One time a whole flock of the confounded creatures had the gall to fly into one of my starboard engines. Locked it up they did. About did me in that time, those little rodents with feathers!” She said sighting down the worn foggy looking scope.
She pulled the trigger but nothing happened, as the air around them started to flicker and heat up from the armor piercing rounds blasting through it all around them.
“Blast!” Eleanor stormed out and bringing one hand up she struck the barrel hard with one small fist.
The missile abruptly launched catapulting both Talaric and Eleanor back through the air slightly as the small air to air missile streaked off towards its target.
The jet pilot never saw it coming, or probably better put, never expected it to come and took the missile directly to the nose.
In the aftermath of watching the burning jet streak off towards the ground to one side it became readily apparent how fast they were falling. The ground was alarmingly close!
It was going to be a hard landing.
Eleanor cried out, “I knew I shouldn’t have eaten that second apple this morning! My greediness is apt to get us both killed Sir!”
Talaric burst out laughing no doubt somewhat hysterically given the situation. The incongruity of her statement was absurd. She could barely weigh anything over a hundred pounds soaking wet, but he weighed close to two hundred and thirty pounds.
They landed.
Hard.
Chapter Ten
Long Walk
Talaric lifted his head up feeling like an old man and spit sand out of his mouth. Sitting up he groaned and held a hand to his head. His pack was several feet away and the shreds of the chute still billowed out weakly behind him. Where was Eleanor?
A Warrior's Return Page 11